As David Weigel reported a few weeks ago, during one of Grover Norquist’s weekly breakfast meetings, some participants hit up the idea of launching a pledge for members of Congress to take vowing not to vote on healthcare reform legislation unless they’d read the entire bill.
A short time later, Let Freedom Ring announced its “Responsible Healthcare Reform Pledge” which has, to date, secured several dozen congressional commitments to do just that.
But one name that is not on the list is Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe, and for good reason:
At a town hall meeting Wednesday Sen. Jim Inhofe told Chickasha residents he does not need to read the 1,000 page health care reform bill, he will simply vote against it.
“I don’t have to read it, or know what’s in it. I’m going to oppose it anyways,” he said.
Back in June he similarly decided that he didn’t even need to bother meeting with Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor because he wasn’t going to vote for her anyway:
Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) is dead set on voting against Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination. In fact, he’s so certain of his position that he refuses to even meet with her.
Sotomayor has been meeting privately with Senators over the last few weeks, but when it was Inhofe’s turn, he declined.
Inhofe’s spokesman explained that since the Senator has already decided to vote against the nomination, there’s no reason to waste time on a sit-down discussion.
It sure must make the job of being a senator easier when you just decide in advance that you aren’t going to support something and thereby can avoid the tedious task of actually understanding an issue so that you can cast an informed vote on it.
