A little side note on the DeLay Rule vote.
If we can go by comments released by congressional offices, quite a substantial number of Republican members of congress happened to have stepped out of the room (to get food, go to the bathroom, attend to constituent business, etc.) right about the time they did the voice vote on the DeLay Rule.
Illinois’s Tim Johnson, for instance, just couldn’t make it. He was there for most of the meeting but had to step out for a “constituent meeting,” according to TPM readers who’ve called his congressional office. He has no official position on the DeLay Rule at all.
Presumably they still had a quorum.
