Thursday, February 17

There wasn't a whole lot of action today.  HF 267 was unanimously passed simply with opening & closing arguments.  The Senate, however, debated amendments and amendments to amendments concerning HF 45 (the Taxpayers First Act).  I think there are nearly 30 amendments to debate.  It will be interesting to see how different the TFA will be coming out of the Senate than how it came out of the House.

There are small speakers around the capitol that can broadcast live from either chamber, and one of them is next to the switchboard, and while listening to the debate I found the respective parties arguing the same points on the same topics that the House did. For this reason, it seems to me that it would have saved time to stick both the Reps and Senators in the same room for 24 straight hours for debate, take a 20-minute break, then 24 more hours of debate.  If they are all still too stubborn to find some semblance of similar ground, then take coffee away from them until they do.

Or we could take coffee away at the beginning and have a solution in two hours.