Finance Committee Democrat Won’t Read Text of Health Bill

One more item that separates Democrats and Republicans on issues. Let's compare the comments of the Democrat Carper of Delaware and Republican Cornyn of Texas and see which one belongs in the Senate and which one is a lightweight and probably should have never been elected to the US Senate.

Sen Carper: “I don’t expect to actually read the legislative language because reading the legislative language is among the more confusing things I’ve ever read in my life,” Carper told CNSNews.com.

Carper described the type of language the actual text of the bill would finally be drafted in as "arcane," "confusing," "hard stuff to understand," and "incomprehensible." He likened it to the "gibberish" used in credit card disclosure forms.

Sen Cornyn: “The conceptual language is not good enough,” said Cornyn. “We’ve seen that there are side deals that have been cut, for example, with some special interest groups like the hospital association to hold them harmless from certain cuts that would impact how the CBO scores the bill or determines cost. So we need to know not only the conceptual language, we need to know the detailed legislative language, and we need to know what kind of secret deals have been cut on the side which would have an impact on how much this bill is going to cost and how it will affect health care in America.”

What we have is a Democrat too lazy to try to understand Obamacare bill or has a reading comprehension problem sitting on the Finance Committee compared to a Republican that that wants to know every detail of the legislation. For Carper to say Senators and the American public would not understand the legislative language is an affront to the two Senate Doctors Coburn (R-OK) and Barrazzo (R-WY), other Senators, and the American public. Carper pushing not reading the bill makes one wonder what is in the bill they don't want us to see.

Our question for the US Senate: What are Senators doing voting on bills when they don't understand the language of the bill? Maybe our Senate candidates should be required to pass a reading comprehension test to run for office. Carper saying he cannot understand legislative language makes one wonder how he ever was elected not to mention how he was appointed to the Finance Committee. Since Carper cannot understand the bills he is voting on in the Finance Committee, maybe he and other Democrats that don't read bills might want to consider retiring and being replaced with someone with higher reading skills.

Finance Committee Democrat Won’t Read Text of Health Bill
Says Anyone Who Claims They’ll Understand It ‘Is Trying to Pull the Wool Over Our Eyes’

CNS News
10/02/09
Nicholas Ballasy

(CNSNews.com) - Sen. Thomas Carper (D.-Del.), a member of the Senate Finance Committee, told CNSNews.com that he does not “expect” to read the actual legislative language of the committee’s health care bill because it is “confusing” and that anyone who claims they are going to read it and understand it is fooling people.
“I don’t expect to actually read the legislative language because reading the legislative language is among the more confusing things I’ve ever read in my life,” Carper told CNSNews.com.

Carper described the type of language the actual text of the bill would finally be drafted in as "arcane," "confusing," "hard stuff to understand," and "incomprehensible." He likened it to the "gibberish" used in credit card disclosure forms.

Last week, the Finance Committee considered an amendment offered by Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) that would have required the committee to post the full actual language of the proposed legislation online for at least 72 hours before holding a final committee vote on it. The committee defeated the amendment 13-10.

Sometime in the wee hours of this morning, according to the Associated Press, the Finance Committee finished work on its health-care bill. "It was past 2 a.m. in the East--and Obama's top health care adviser, Nancy-Ann DeParle in attendance--when Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., the committee chairman, announced that work had been completed on all sections of the legislation," said the AP.

Thus far, however, the committee has not produced the actual legislative text of the bill. Instead the senators have been working with “conceptual language”—or what some committee members call a “plain English” summary or description of the bill.
Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), who sits on the committee, told CNSNews.com on Thursday that the panel was just following its standard practice in working with a “plain language description” of the bill rather than an actual legislative text.

“It’s not just conceptual, it’s a plain language description of the various provisions of the bill is what the Senate Finance Committee has always done when it passes legislation and that is turned into legislative language which is what is presented to the full Senate for consideration,” said Bingaman.

But Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who also serves on the committee, said the descriptive language the committee is working with is not good enough because things can get slipped into the legislation unseen.

“The conceptual language is not good enough,” said Cornyn. “We’ve seen that there are side deals that have been cut, for example, with some special interest groups like the hospital association to hold them harmless from certain cuts that would impact how the CBO scores the bill or determines cost. So we need to know not only the conceptual language, we need to know the detailed legislative language, and we need to know what kind of secret deals have been cut on the side which would have an impact on how much this bill is going to cost and how it will affect health care in America.”

Excerpt: See CNS for Full Article