More Cap-N-Trade Tax Information, Part 5

Here's a revealing update from Michelle Malkin's live-blogging of the House debate from this afternoon:

At approx. 2:35pm Eastern, GOP Rep. Joe Barton announced that there is now a placeholder in the bill to be determined later.

Barton notes that this is unprecedented. He can't recall any final passage of a bill that has a placeholder in it.

What the hell is going on?

This is deliberation? This is transparency?

Barton continues: "If you haven't made your deal yet, come on down to the floor." Waxman is making deals to pass the cap and trade bill right on the House floor.

Barton: "This is unprecedented…At least he's doing it out in the open now."

2:49pm: Corruptocrat Rangel chastises Republicans and praises horse-trading, deal-trading on the floor. "This vote will be remembered by the world."

Right...the day the American Congress doomed America.  Another unbelievable exchange:

4:02pm: Barney Frank on the floor. The placeholder has to do with regulating financial derivatives related to reducing carbon emissions. Says he's confident they'll have a good system in place.

Trust Barney Frank?
Criiiiikey.

4:05pm: Excellent exchange between chair and GOP Rep. Louis Gohmert. He asks for a physical copy of the 300-page-plus late-night amendment filed out of public view. Chair cannot tell him where one is. Rules him out of order for not making parliamentary inquiry. Chair stumped.

Barton asks chair if there is any rule requiring copy of bill being voted on to be nearby. Chair: Not that I'm aware of.

Barton asks if official copy is necessary to be at desk for final vote.

Chair says it's at the desk. Barton says it's not the official copy. Markey tells him to go to the cloakroom and look it up on the web.

Markey says the full bill and manager's amendment is on the desk.

Chair rules that all the piles of paper at the desk "in effect" are an "official copy."

WHO'S ON FIRST?

By the way, the manager's amendment is in PDF form here.

By the way, there are a number of newspapers that have also come out against this cap-n-tax bill.  Here are a couple summaries:

The Washington Post, Editorial: "Waxman-Markey… is this the best we can hope for?...During the campaign, President Obama supported the cleanest variation of this mechanism: selling all emission allowances at auction. This week he abandoned that sensible stance with a full-throated endorsement of Waxman-Markey, which gives away 85 percent of the pollution credits in the first years of the program and provides many avenues potentially to evade compliance…we think it's too soon to settle for something that falls so far short of ideal." (6/26/09)

The Wall Street Journal, Editorial: "The Cap and Tax Fiction… House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has put cap-and-trade legislation on a forced march through the House... It looks as if the Democrats will have to destroy the discipline of economics to get it done... The whole point of cap and trade is to hike the price of electricity and gas so that Americans will use less. These higher prices will show up not just in electricity bills or at the gas station but in every manufactured good, from food to cars… Even as Democrats have promised that this cap-and-trade legislation won't pinch wallets, behind the scenes they've acknowledged the energy price tsunami that is coming… Americans should know that those Members who vote for this climate bill are voting for what is likely to be the biggest tax in American history. Even Democrats can't repeal that reality." (6/26/09)

Investor's Business Daily, Editorial: "'Waxman-Markey: Man-Made Disaster... Not since a misguided piece of legislation imposed tariffs that turned a recession into a depression has there been a piece of legislation as bad as Waxman-Markey… Its centerpiece is a "cap and trade" provision that has been rightfully derided as "cap and tax." It is in fact a tax on energy everywhere it is consumed on everything it is used to make or provide. It is the largest tax increase in American history… Consumers would pay through the nose as electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket, as President Obama once put it, by 90% adjusted for inflation… Hit hardest by all this would be the "95% of working families" Obama keeps mentioning as being protected from increased taxation." (6/25/09)

There are 14 at this link.  I suspect there are more around the country.

Have you called your Rep yet??

There's my two cents.