Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Constitutionally Supported?

POSTED BY JHW22

Soooo.... apparently a new House of Representatives rule requires Representatives to provide proof in each proposed bill that the bill is supported by some part of the Constitution. Yep, they insist that each bill have supporting evidence that it's Constitutional. Cool. I guess.

Homework assignment: find the part in the Constitution that says Congress can rename Post Offices. Alright, fine, you don't need to do any homework. The Constitution does say that Congress will "establish Post Offices and post Roads" in Article 1, Section 8 but that one statement barely seems substantial enough to validate the hundreds of renaming bills that are introduced every Congress.

Now, look, I don't have a problem with a post office being named after a fallen member of our armed services or a firefighter who died in the Twin Towers. I don't have a problem with that. I just think it's funny that the Republicans created a new rule just to pander to the teabaggers that will in effect, limit the amount of pandering they can do by naming a building after someone.

On a slight tangent, I keep hearing (like in the ABC link above) that the reading of the Constitution by the new House is a "first." Yet, that seems odd to me and I swear Keith Olbermann said a bit ago that it has been done twice before. I tend to believe Olbermann on this. So, this goes back to my running annoyances and distrusts of the media -- why must they report with such certainty something they likely haven't bothered to fact-check? The talking points from the media can be as nauseating as the talking points from politicians.

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