Get ready to hear this word a lot: Reconciliation
Ξ October 16th, 2009 | → Comments Off | ∇ Politics |
Reconciliation is an obscure Senate rule established in the 1970′s under what is known as the “Byrd Rule” to allow for the bypassing of filibusters in certain circumstances. Democrats have started to process to use the rule to pass the House version of national health care (H.R. 3200). National Review interviewed Rep. Paul Ryan (R., Wis) to get a little bit of background:
“The reconciliation process was designed for the budget and to help reduce deficits and debt. Now it’s being used to create new entitlement programs. . . .”
“[B]oth sides will have an argument with the Senate parliamentarian about the Byrd rule, which says that parts of a bill can be eliminated if they do not directly reduce the deficit. It also says that you can’t bring incidental things into the bill. It’s like going to court.”
“Then the Democratic-appointed parliamentarian comes down with a ruling, saying whether this provision is in or out of the bill. It will look at subsidies, too,” says Ryan. “The question will be whether community rating — where health-insurance companies are mandated to provide coverage — is a direct-spending policy. The argument will revolve around these policies, and their need to go into effect, or not, and their fiscal outcomes.”
“A few years ago, we tried to pass medical-liability reform, which is always filibustered in the Senate,” recalls Ryan. “We said that if we stick it in reconciliation, we can pass it, since tort reform, according to the CBO, will reduce the federal government’s health-care costs. The parliamentarian said no, saying it was not a money-saving policy. We lost that one. We’ve also tried to stick ANWR [drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge] in reconciliation before, arguing that it was a revenue-raising provision. We got it in there, but it didn’t work.”
“Using reconciliation is an art form, not a science,” says Ryan. Republicans “will have a lot of room to fight.”
“Using the tort-reform precedent from our own experience a few years ago, Republicans will be able to argue that a lot of the junk the Democrats want can’t go in the bill,” says Ryan. “That’s where Republican leaders like Senator Jon Kyl will be able to make some major arguments against the use of reconciliation.”
I suspect we’re going to be seeing a lot of abuse of this rule in the future, and a lot of discussion about whether or not to eliminate it.
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