House 'Borders On A Dictatorship"

POSTED BY ARNOLD HAMILTON

So much for Speaker Chris Benge's more open, collegial House.

The wingnut wing of the Republican caucus is firmly in control once again, stifling debate with impunity and force-feeding its far-out legislative agenda with parliamentary trickery.

The kinder, gentler House that Benge promised collapsed in a Democratic walkout today, all 44 minority-party members showing their disgust with Republican heavy-handedness that House Minority Leader Danny Morgan said "borders on a dictatorship."

Somewhere, former GOP Speakers Todd Hiett and Lance Cargill must be smiling.

The walkout came the morning after two contentious committee meetings. Without allowing discussion, Republicans in the House Judiciary and Public Safety Committee substituted a 133-page "tort reform" package for a four-page rural hospital bill and rejected a measure in the House Economic Development and Financial Services Commitee that would have required insurance companies to cover costs related to autism.

It also came one week after Rep. Guy Liebmann, R-OKC, chairman of the General Government and Transportation Committee, refused to allow Cherokee Nation Chief Chad Smith to speak in opposition to the wingnuts' English-only initiative.

House Democrats have two beefs, both legitimate.

First, not only is the general public -- at the whim of the committee chair -- being denied the right to speak in "public" committee hearings, but legislators themselves are being silenced, thwarted from asking questions or debating issues. Bottom line: Duly elected representatives are being prevented -- by fiat -- from carrying out their official duties.

Second, House rules are set up so that GOP chairs are now the sole arbiters of whether amendments are germane to specific legislation. House rules are supposed to prohibit rolling separate and discrete subjects into a single piece of legislation. When an amendment is submitted on the House floor, lawmakers can challenge whether it is germane. If the speaker rules it is, a lawmaker -- with the support of 15 others -- can demand the entire House vote on the matter. If an amendment is submitted in committee, however, the chair decides whether it is germane -- a ruling that cannot be appealed in committee or later on the House floor.

In the Judiciary Committee, Chairman Rex Duncan, R-Sand Springs, ruled the tort reform language was germane to the rural hospital bill. Never mind that civil procedure is found in an entirely different section of Oklahoma law. Tort reform -- essentially locking the courthouse door to ordinary Oklahomans who have been wronged -- is a Holy Grail for the reactionary right. Duncan marched in lockstep, basically ruling it was germane because he said so.

Don't be misled into thinking this is just so much inside baseball, a typical parliamentary skirmish between partisans. What is taking place in some House committees meets the definition of fascism.

House Democratic leaders met with Benge to discuss the matter, asking for specific rules changes to ensure democracy is not stifled. Benge promised an answer by Monday.

Don't hold your breath that anything will change. Benge is a captive of the House's reactionary right, the old Hiett-Cargill cabal that is so convinced of the righteousness of their cause that they're willing to steamroll anybody or anything in their path, including children with autism.

The sad thing is, Benge is a nice guy. A conservative, yes. But not mean-spirited. He's always been willing to let opponents be heard. And unlike some of his wingnut colleagues, he doesn't think he's smarter than everybody else or that he's on a religious crusade to remake Oklahoma in what he considers to be God's image.

Benge, though, is on the hot seat. He's trying to hold together a fractured caucus, currently driven by about three-dozen of the loudest, most extreme rightwingers in recent memory.

Most House speakers rule with an iron fist. The committee chairs do what the speaker commands -- or else. Benge meekly demurs to his committee chairs, saying repeatedly they're given "certain discretion" in conducting committee business.

How Benge handles this crisis will determine whether he's a token, caretaker speaker -- or a speaker to remember.