I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
While Congress is still out of session, the wrangling over health care reform never ends. The latest news from Washington is that Democrats appear to have decided to forgo a traditional conference committee, and instead engage in a process known as “ping ponging” a bill.
The New Republic’s Jon Cohn explains:
“‘Ping pong’ is a reference to one way the House and Senate could proceed. With ping-ponging, the chambers send legislation back and forth to one another until they finally have an agreed-upon version of the bill. But even ping-ponging can take different forms and some people use the term generically to refer to any informal negotiations. Whatever form the final discussions take place, a decision to bypass conference would undoubtedly expedite the debate, clearing the way for final passage (if not signing) by the end of January.”
House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman Henry Waxman told the liberal blog Firedoglake that the reason that Democratic leadership would be using this process is because otherwise, it would face more obstruction from health care opponents on the Senate side of Capitol Hill.
This will not be a traditional conference committee, Waxman said, because the motions to select and instruct conferees in the Senate “would need 60 votes all over again.” Instead, whatever agreements made could be packaged in an amendment to the bills passed by the House and Senate.
The work by Democrats in reconciling the differences between the two versions of health care reform bill (both the House and Senate must pass identical legislation before it can be sent to the president for signature) is beginning — and Democrats are hoping to have it finished by the end of January.
All five members of Congress representing New Mexico, two Senators and three Representatives, voted to pass the legislation.
