[quote name='IRHari']Bob, who the
defended someone who didn't read the bill? Examples please.[/QUOTE]
Oh, a few...
[quote name='mykevermin']I think they know what's in it.
There's some cognitive disconnect (or, rather, unintentional dishonesty) involved when people accuse politicians of not reading bills.
1) Those who levy the criticisms don't read the bills themselves (which is fine by itself, as that's an arduous task, right?)
2) They allow their online networks of like-minded colleagues to do the legwork, citing their critiques with virtually no follow-up to verify those criticisms.
So they (like elprincipe above) rely on the "knowledge of the aggregate" to take care of the burden of being expected to read, crossreference, and critique a several thousand page document.
The disconnect happens because folks seem to think that the "knowledge of the aggregate" technique works for them, but could never work in Congress. No explanation is given, and we are led to believe that this is the case based on stereotypical assumptions of laziness and ineptitude on Capitol Hill. It's not quite that self-evident, really, and the dishonesty in crab-assing about "they don't read the bills!" is quite tiresome.[/QUOTE]
[quote name='mykevermin']I see what you're trying to point out. Nevertheless, what I'm trying to say is that there are more than 638 people on Capitol Hill who come across the bill. Call it a division of labor, call it relying on gophers, call it what you will - reading the text of a given bill is not the only way to come across knowledge of what it contains and implies.
In short, criticizing politicians for not reading legislation is an apt criticism if you want them to read it. But criticizing them for not knowing what is in the bill because they have not read it personally is not an inherently factual claim.[/QUOTE]
[quote name='dmaul1114']Absolutely. One can have a firm grasp of all the facets of a bill from detailed bullet points put together by staffers etc. Bills have a ton of useless language and can be condensed into summaries and bullet points that accurately outline the laws it would put in place etc. And the congressmen can go by that and look up the parts of the bill that concern them based on those summaries in the real bill.
I do the same sometimes in my research work with having an assistant read and summarize a stack of articles related to the topic so I have that as my starting point and can just read the ones that are most pertinent in more detail.[/QUOTE]
[quote name='dmaul1114']Country--hopefully. As we won't look like a third world country in terms of health care (lack of) for the working poor.
Daily lives? Not really. Some will be better as they have access to health care. The rest of us that have always had health care will be relatively unaffected. Maybe premiums will go up or down for some, but I don't see my daily life changing at all since I did well for myself and will never have issues getting jobs with good benefits.
Again, they can do just as well with having other prepare detailed summaries for them. Sure one staffer may miss some key point--but across all the 100s of congressmen and 100 senators, every key point will come up and be addressed in floor debate, so I don't see it as a huge issue personally.[/QUOTE]
[quote name='mykevermin']Reading ≠ knowledge. Clinging onto the "they must read it" argument is simply tenuous, because you're not addressing that people come across plenty of knowledge and understanding without actual hands-on work. Copy notes, read summaries, cliffs notes - so many people do it in education as is.
Would you hold so strongly onto this idea if a given politician could accurately and immediately respond to any question about the bill, thereby demonstrating their knowledge? Of course you wouldn't, as you inherently distrust politicians. Not a bad starting point by itself, mind you, but let's be honest: you're holding steadfast onto a ritual that is absolutely separable from the problem that you think results from it. You therefore have little reason to hang onto the exaltation of that ritual.[/QUOTE]
[quote name='dmaul1114']No worries. I have 0 desire to every do anything related to politics or public office.
But I agree wholeheartedly with Myke. The key is that they have a knowledge of the bills. And they can acquire that without reading these stupid, overly long and wordy pieces of legislation by having trusted aids condense it down to a more usable format. Every key issue will be raised at some point by someone in the house or senate. Pork and other things get through as people don't care about it, or as you note, bills just get rushed to votes etc. Less from senators going off bullet points/summaries which probably included the pork anyway.
Honestly, there should probably be a congressional office tasked with condensing bills down to a more digestible format that's approved by a committee as being 100% representative of the bill so there's an official "cliff's notes" version of each bill--at least each bill over a certain length.[/QUOTE]
