Palin: Correct about the VP's Role in the Senate
—Jack M.
Lots of different blogs are posting stories about the political left's newest attack on Sarah Palin, so I won't link any in particular. Suffice it to say that the gist of all the stories is that the left is outraged that Palin told a 3rd Grader that the role of the Vice President is to be "in charge of the senate".
Here's the CNN story that started the left's latest tantrum: "Palin takes heat for saying VP in charge of the Senate."
This manufactured outrage is just an extension of the "Palin doesn't know what a VP does" meme that started a few weeks ago when an old CNBC interview ran with a clip of the Governor demurring on her prospects of being selected as McCain's running mate because (paraphrasing) "someone would have to tell me what VP's do" (the context making it obvious to most fair observers that she was trying to joke about the VP's relative lack of portfolio vs. that of a Governor).
But Palin is actually right: The Constitution empowers the Vice President to Preside over the Senate. The majority party cannot prevent him/her from doing so.
And this matters. Why?
Because whoever sits in that chair has actual parliamentary power in a couple of areas.
For example, say you are watching C-Span and you hear two Senators shouting at the chair for the privilege of speaking, or to ask a procedural question. The only person who is recognized to legitimately take the floor, is, by Senate rules, the person who the Presiding Officer hears and acknowledges first.
If Palin were in that chair, she could make the call as to who is recognized to speak or to ask a parliamentary question. By using this ability, Palin could, in fact, structure the order of debate or to render a procedural inquiry moot.
In fact, procedurally the President of the Senate (or their designee) makes all the calls. The President of the Senate can be overturned by a vote of the Senate, but, absent that vote, the ruling of the Chair governs the action on the floor. It is not far fetched to say that on a controversial bill, a President of the Senate who wished to delay proceedings could in fact force repeated votes to overturn his or her rulings.
Let me share a real world example from my memory with you:
In 2000, when Bill Clinton was President, he appointed a really liberal judge named Richard Paez to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. The vote was expected to be close (it ended up being 59-39) and Al Gore showed up to preside over the Senate.
Why? Because Al Gore was campaigning for President, and Paez was a vote in which Hispanic activist groups (La Raza in particular) had been particularly interested in happening. The GOP had bottled Paez' nomination up under Orrin Hatch's judiciary chairmanship for over 4 years due to Paez' record of activism. I think, but am not certain, that Paez was particularly politically important because he was a "first": i.e. the "first Hispanic" to be appointed to the 9th Circuit.
So Gore shows up, But there was a hitch. Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions had discovered that Richard Paez just so happened to be the same judge who was presiding over some of the Gore-illegal campaign contributions cases in California. To many, including Sessions who made the case on the Senate floor, it appeared that Paez was being rewarded with a judicial nomination for his "good work" in protecting Gore. Paez only received his nomination to the 9th Circuit, after the Gore cases had been sent to him. (An interesting fact: Paez wasn't assigned the Gore cases randomly as is the custom; he was specifically tasked with them). It looked like a clear conflict of interest (would a judge interested in advancing his career undermine the man who had appointed him and the man who could, if he were elected, consider advancing him to the Supreme Court?).
Anyway, I can remember watching Sessions do a ballsy thing. With Gore sitting in the chair, Sessions pointed out that their was a Standing Rule of the Senate that prevented the Presiding officer from voting on any issue in which they have a personal or financial conflict of interest. Sessions essentially tried to disqualify Gore from presiding over the vote by arguing that Gore shouldn't be voting on promoting a Judge who was handling a criminal case implicating Gore.
Gore was forced to rule in favor of himself in order to resolve the dispute.
