Markey: if you like fiction try Atlas Shrugged
Congresswoman Betsy Markey told KUSA’s Adam Schrager that she read the cap and trade bill. In fact her approach to any legislation is to “read the bill. I talk to my staff. I talk to people on the committee. And then I go out and talk to my constiuents and hear what they have to say.” The final version ended up being 1428 pages long with some 276,000 words. At an average rate of 250 words per minute, it would have taken her 18 hours to read the cap and trade bill assuming she did nothing else — not sleep, not eat, and took it with her to the bathroom.
Color me skeptical. Americans for Tax Reform reports that not one member of the House of Representatives read the whole bill.
If she didn’t read the bill (even though she says she did), this wouldn’t be the first time she hasn’t read a piece of very expensive legislation before voting yes. Last February, Markey confirmed to me in an interview available at Audio on Demand on News Talk 1310 that she didn’t read the stimulus bill. Furthermore, she wasn’t concerned about approving an $800 billion that she didn’t read completely. She also didn’t seem bothered that President Barak Obama broke a campaign pledge to be more transparent and allow for five days worth of public comment before signing legislation.
But assuming that Congresswoman Markey likes to read lengthy pieces of fiction, I hope she’ll pick a better one next time. I would be happy to lend her my copy of Atlas Shrugged.
July 8th, 2009 at 10:55 pm
Big supprise that none of the elected members have read the bill. But they should have at least read the CBO reports that were requested on the bill, one of which say that the bill will result in a loss of 25% of income to the Federal Budget as the result of highter expenses for business as the result of the Caps. As I said in my Cap and Betrayed, this is a disaster for the economy, If congress keeps shooting the horses, how are we going to get the country going again.