Daniel Stone
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Jul 15, 2009 02:52 PM
Sonia Sotomayor knows exactly what she must do to be confirmed, and that's very little. If she doesn't say too much, she can't muddy the wide respect across party lines that all but guarantee her a spot on the high court. But even if legal experts aren't learning much about what kind of justice Sotormayor may be, members of the judiciary committee (as well as Sotomayor herself) are doing their best to keep the mood light. Here are the top five moments so far from the judge's third day under the lights.
1. Well then I'll do it myself: You can’t rely on anyone else to make a point better than you can do it yourself. So when Sen. Tom Coburn, a practicing doctor, wanted to press Sotomayor on abortion, he did his own dirty work. “Let's say I'm 38 weeks pregnant and we discover a small spina bifida sack on…the lower part of the back on my baby. And I feel like I just can't handle a child with that. Would it be legal in this country to terminate that child's life?” Over some snickers from the press table, Sotomayor declined to answer, saying the issue might come before the court. Really? Because we’d be very surprised.
2. Wake-up call: Just as Sotomayor was in the middle of a long and rather rambly answer, the lights in the room went off but were quickly picked up by a back-up power generator. Sotomayor stuttered slightly as everyone in the room looked around confused. “I hope I can go on…” she said. Leahy shot back to the room “I just want every to know that that was not a comment from above. I have certain powers as chairman but not that much."
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Holly Bailey
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Jul 15, 2009 11:52 AM
One down, four more committees to go: In a party line vote, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, aka HELP, approved a bill that would overhaul the nation’s health care. It’s the first committee to act on President Obama’s push to tackle health care reform. The HELP bill, approved in a 13-10 vote, would require Americans to have insurance and provide a federal subsidy for those who can’t afford it. Under the bill, employers would be required to provide insurance to their workers or pay the federal government a fee to do so. It would also give people the right to enroll in that frequently mentioned public plan. The big question mark is cost, and from here, the bill will to go the Senate Finance Committee, which is still trying to figure out how to pay for it all. At a private meeting Monday, President Obama pressed Finance chair Max Baucus to get a bill out of his committee by the end of the week, but it’s unclear if that will actually happen. With Obama’s blessing, Baucus has been trying to strike a deal that would both Republicans and conservative Democrats, who have raised questions about the bill’s cost and its impact on the growing federal deficit.
But the drama isn't just limited to the Senate side. In the House, Democrats unveiled their version of reform yesterday, which is similar to what the Senate HELP committee approved. Three House committees must now take up the legislation, before it heads to a vote of the full House, where Speaker Nancy Pelosi faces a tough fight to keep Democrats on board. Not unlike the Senate, Blue Dog Democrats and the House GOP have been openly skeptical about the cost of an overhaul. Obama is hoping both chambers will approve their respective bills by the August recess, in hopes that lawmakers can return and negotiate a final sweeping bill in the fall. But with concerns about cost growing by the day, Democrats have been openly skeptical that will happen. Still, Obama, who has ratcheted up his public lobbying for health care reform in recent days, is celebrating every victory he can get, even if it’s a small one. In a statement from the White House this morning, the president praised the HELP committee’s vote this morning. “The HELP committee’s success should give us hope, but it should not give us pause,” Obama said. “It should instead provide the urgency for both the House and Senate to finish their critical work on health reform before the August recess.”
