Who are these "slick" people? Why it is none less than the Virginia State Senate! Granted, this is not as bad as when former Delegate Dick Black said the Senate was "aligned with various elements of vice and so forth." But it certainly doesn't bode well for a legislator even remotely being considered for chairmanship of any committee to say nothing for his effectiveness in working even within in his own subcommittees!
Well, my ol' buddy Greg over at DPVA reminded me today of how Republicans this past 2007 session refused to allow subcommittee votes to be recorded. These are subcommittees with as few as 3, 4, maybe 5 legislators on them! Meanwhile GOP leader Morgan Griffith in front of rolling media cameras exclaims, "A subcommittee cannot kill a bill". Click here to listen to that statement.
So, Del. Welch, what was that you were saying about subcommittees?
Well, maybe that's what they told the media, but Del. John Welch had a very different take on the matter at a meeting of the Tidewater Libertarians last month", says Greg. "In fact, he thinks it's a "great thing" that subcommittees of five people (sometimes as few as three) can defeat a bill far from the public's prying eyes."
Says Welch: "The great thing about what we did last year in the House, we gave killing power to subcommittees. So now I'm a subcommittee chair on 2 committees now. We can actually kill a bill in subcommittee and it can not come up in full committee. It used to be that to be able to be killed in the subcommittee and go in front of the full committee and then it would get passed, and move on, so the Senate knew how to work that game. So now I have to serve as one of 5 people on my subcommittee, and as a subcommittee chair I can usually wheel and deal with just four people. They know it's a different world out there now. They have to come to me and they have to strike deals. And one of them [sic] deals is that you have to treat me as a peer and not as a servant. So that is where we are."
Click here to listen to Welch. "I got the killing power now!", he says.
"Wheel and deal" his subcommittee? Referring to the Virginia State Senate as "slick" and knowing how "to work that game"? Now that is true leadership... NOT! What a crock! How disgraceful! We need to boot this guy out on his little subcommittee fiefdom arse.
