It’s pretty remarkable that in this town Republican parliamentary tactics more appropriate for junior high school student council barely get passing notice or criticism. The truth is, in their heart of hearts, most reporters kind of admire the GOP for it.
So here’s where we are today. With real unemployment in the range of 20 percent, Senate Republicans are making Democrats vote over and over on “controversial” amendments to the reconciliation bill — not because they have any real chance of stopping the reconciliation bill, or of seeing their amendments passed, but because it allows them to produce TV attack ads for the fall.
Here’s our Top 10 Most Ridiculous GOP-Proposed Health Care Amendments, led by the esteemed Dr. Tom Coburn’s amendment to ban federal funding of Viagra for sex offenders.
Next time a Republican senator goes on TV and says that instead of reforming our health care system, President Obama should have been focusing on jobs, jobs, jobs, maybe someone can ask him or her what Senate Republicans spent most of this week doing. Just for grins.
David Kurtz
David Kurtz is Managing Editor and Washington Bureau Chief of Talking Points Memo where he oversees the news operations of TPM and its sister sites.