(#4569) Yesterday was a really fun day in the Senate

      No, I am not still hallucinating from my recent bout of illness. I watched with humor yesterday one interchange that about had me laughing out loud. During a tiring process of amendments the lead senator on several of them, Delaware's Tom Carper and West Virginia's Shelley Capito announced a rule that the next vote would be for only 15 minutes so Senators needed to get down to the floor for the vote or they would be excluded from the vote. Well, 37 minutes later the vote was finally ended and me along with a lot of others were livid that the 15 minute rule that was just established had been so callously violated.
     I kept thinking, damn did they forget to put somebody in place to actually keep time? Anyway, while I was still yelling at the television, the longest serving Senator, Vermont's Pat Leahy, spoke up and did what I wanted to do in the same moment. He asked for a parliamentary inquiry into how long the last 15 minute vote actually took. Well the temporary president of the Senate conferred with the clerks and then answered Senator Leahy's question with 37 minutes. For a brief moment I wanted to howl a laugh but instead sat back and savored the answer. Not so with many on the Senate floor as they sort of erupted in guffaws and snickered laughter.
     Immediately Senator Carper took back the floor and announced that he apologized for the extended time and gave an excuse that soothed all our souls. He said some negotiations had been going on over the next 2 amendments to be called to allow them to pass with only a voice vote. It was getting later in the evening and this answer calmed everyone down. As the process continued with the promised instantaneous voice votes instead of the timed votes I actually laughed because Senator Leahy wasn't in the loop on the negotiated change as were many of the other Senators nor we watching on Cspan2. The culmination of the Senator Leahy question was to me a syncing of the minds in the Senate and we out here in the world and for that fun little moment we were all on the same page.