From Reid’s statement:
Even with all this hard work on our side, the commitments the administration made to me before August break were not met. In the almost three months since that break, we have received no Democratic nominees to full-time commission positions. For some, in fact, absolutely no discernable progress has been made. With Thanksgiving break looming, the administration informed me that they would make several recess appointments. I indicated I would be willing to confirm various appointments if the administration would agree to move on Democratic appointments. They would not make that commitment. As a result, I am keeping the Senate in pro-forma to prevent recess appointments until we get this process back on track.
A small step towards the kind of confrontation that should’ve opened this 110th Congress. There have been way too many concessions to President Bush’s bullyism. He will either go into full gridlock with his stubborn, irresponsible oppositionalism or he’ll play ball – either case being an improvement over following him down the yellow brick road. If we have 430 days of a constipated government, so be it. Nothing could be worse than what we have now – a petulent pre-adolescent President trying to appoint other ideologues and incompetents while passing a series of CYA legislation to mask his earlier criminal acts and epidemic faux pas. Maybe our Democratic leaders are finally beginning to get their bearings in this Administration’s sea of smoke and mirrors…
I just called one of Senator Reid’s offices in his home state to thank him for what he is doing to try to prevent Bush from appointing another recess appointment. It is about time, I might also add that his DC office voicemail is full. John Dean former Nixon White House lawyer during Watergate said on one of the shows the other night that he had hoped Senator Reid would do just that and he is a Republican. I don’t think you have to desert the Republican party to do the right thing for our country. I think that the Republicans in the House and the Senate think that all they have to do is wear an American flag pin on their lapels to prove that they are Americans first. Republican congressmen think that they can side with Bush and vote with him and then wear their pin to declare their support for America