Senators Block D.C. Vote Bill, Delivering Possibly Fatal Blow
Republican lawmakers yesterday blocked the Senate from taking up the D.C. vote bill, a potentially fatal setback for the District's most promising effort in years to get a full member of Congress.
The vote was on a motion to simply consider the bill. Fifty-seven senators voted in favor, three short of the 60 needed to proceed. Without enough support to vault the Senate's procedural hurdles, the bill is expected to stall this year and possibly next year.
Proponents have portrayed the bill as a civil rights measure, saying that depriving a majority African American city of a vote echoes discriminatory practices outlawed decades ago. They also have said it is hypocritical for the United States to fight for voting rights in Iraq while denying them in its own capital.
"It's time to end the injustice, the national embarrassment that citizens of this great capital city don't have voting representation in Congress," Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.), a co-sponsor of the bill, said in a brief floor session before the vote. Opponents did not make speeches.
So, once again, a bill was kept from coming to a full vote by a small number of Republican senators. Among this group deciding the fate of the hardworking people of D.C., (who, by the way, not only pay all the same taxes you do, but also have to put up with obnoxious political types every day), are such upstanding citizens as Sen. Larry Craig (R-Sex Sting) and Sen. David Vitter (R-Hookers).
See how your senators voted here, and if they voted against bringing this bill up for a full vote, give them an earful.
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