>I mean, barring full scale abuse of the Patriot Act (abuse that would humble even its staunchest >supporters), I really don't see how it will be repealed.
That's the point- the sunset provision means we don't have to get it repealed, we just have to block its being passed again. The difference is this- repeal requires winning in the House, have 60 votes in the Senate, and overcoming a possible veto (meaning two-thirds vote required).
Blocking passage means winning in one of those three venues-- and requires only 40 Senate votes.
I know prosaic discussions about concrete margins of passage is treated as a distraction from the serious political discussion, but it's what is the difference between passage and on-passage of legislation.
BTW on a tangentially related issue, I will note that the Bankruptcy Bill is still not law because Senate Dems have refused to approve a compromise with the House. We'll see what happens, but post-S11 economic times may derail the whole thing. But the point is that procedure and party control does matter-- folks would already be being hit with the damn thing if Jeffords hadn't jumped and handed control of conference appointments to Dashcle.
-- Nathan Newman -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <../attachments/20011210/d2220d2f/attachment.htm>