House Passes Keystone XL Bill To Circumvent Obama

by JASmius



Alternate headline: "House Republicans do their part to aid the re-election of Mary Landrieu in stunning bipartisan gesture":

The Republican-led U.S. House of Representatives approved the Keystone XL pipeline on Friday, but a similar measure struggled to get enough support in the Senate and President Barack Obama indicated he might use his veto if the bill does get through Congress.

The legislation, approved by 252 votes to 161, circumvents the need for approval of TransCanada Corp's $8 billion project by the Obama administration, which has been considering it for more than six years.

House lawmakers were confident the Senate would follow suit and pass its version of the bill.

And, thus, too small a margin to override the Obama veto that will be forthcoming, assuming the bill can get through the lame duck Donk Senate.  About which, more below.

Why, you might be asking yourself, did the House start firing off popular conservative legislation so quickly, before their Senate counterparts have formally taken control?

This is why:

The bill's sponsor, Republican Representative Bill Cassidy from Louisiana, said before the vote the House would make it "as easy as possible for the Senate to finally get a bill to the president's desk that approves this long-overdue Keystone XL pipeline." [emphasis added]

Also known as beating Mary Landrieu to the punch by sponsoring and getting passed a Keystone XL bill for which she can only cast a token vote when it goes down in flames on the other side of the Capitol.

Or will it? Senate Jim Inhofe (R-OK) seems oddly confident:

According to Senator Jim Inhofe, there may be enough Democratic votes to override President Barack Obama's expected veto of legislation to authorize construction of the Keystone XL pipeline.

The Oklahoma Republican said Democrats who survived their party's big defeat in the midterm elections November 4th want to keep their distance from the president — so much so that many of them would vote to override a possible veto on the pipeline.

"After the beating the Democrats took, keep in mind we have another election coming up in 2016," Inhofe told WMAL Radio on Thursday, the Washington Free Beacon reported. "There are a lot of Democrats who will not be real excited about President Obama. Just look at the last election – how few Democrats wanted Obama to come into their states to campaign for him."

Asked if he believed Republicans could muster enough Democratic votes to override a presidential veto on the pipeline, Inhofe replied: "I think so."

Well, I don't.  The Assholiated Press estimates there are a total of fifty eight Senate votes for the Cassidy bill, so it likely can't escape a Donk filibuster to even make it to getting killed by an Obama veto, much less get the additional nine votes needed for an override if it somehow did pass.

But consider this a sneak preview of the next couple of years, as the GOP lays the foundation for a successful Scott Walker presidential run in 2016 by forcing The One to veto one popular conservative bill after another - which we know he will.

Incidentally, the polling average for a Landrieu-Cassidy matchup in the last week before Election Day had the Republican challenger up 49%-44%, but now a reported internal survey from a GOP polling firm has Representative Cassidy leading Senator Landrieu by a whopping 56%-40% for the December 6th runoff.  The true margin is probably somewhere in-between.  But it's heartening to see Republicans using their assets to play the political game, and play it to win.