Thursday & Friday, March 10 & 11

The collective bargaining bill was debated Wednesday afternoon/evening, Thursday morning/afternoon/evening, and Friday morning.  When I walked in the chamber in the morning, there were nineteen reps waiting to talk on an amendment to an amendment.  Finally, the Majority Leader made a motion to debate only until noon and then force the voting of the remaining amendments and the bill itself without any debate.  Many of the amendments were declared out of order, and the Speaker even had the power to simply declare an amendment not germane.  It was amazing to me that something like this can be done, but I've been told that the majority party can do almost anything they want.  If they have 51 votes.

Here's how it goes.  The clerk calls up the amendment: "Amendment H-0000 by Hunter (Democrat) of Polk (County)." Then the Speaker says "The gentleman from Polk moves the adoption of amendment H-0000.  Those in favor will say 'aye'. Those opposed say 'no'.  The no's appear to have it; the no's do have it.  The amendment fails."

Here's the amazing thing.  The Democrats, who want the amendment to pass, scream "AYE" at the top of their lungs so the AYE is louder than the NO.  Then the Republicans, the majority, give a half-hearted "no", which is obviously not as loud as the "AYE".  That's when the Speaker says "the no's appear to have it; the no's do have it."  Even though the no's really didn't.  But the thing of it is that if they vote individually (when it shows on the board), the no's will always have more than 50 votes.

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Then the most amazing thing of my whole entire experience happened.  After the final vote of this bill itself, Representative Murphy was granted a "point of personal privilege."  He told the chamber that this morning, the switchboard was empty, and he checked it several times throughout the morning: still empty.  Then, at 11:55 am, five minutes before the forced voting began, he finally saw a page at the switchboard.  By this time, he was yelling (YELLING) and his last words were at the top of his lungs: SHAME ON YOU! I assume he was not referring to the page.  That page was me.  

It was his third point of personal privilege in his 22 years as a representative.