The New Football Season

The 2012 American Football season kicks off today with Dallas Cowboys playing the New York Giants – as many readers of this blog will know (and the title might give a clue), I’m a Washington Redskins fan. Their first game is on Sunday in New Orleans.

I’m a subscriber to NFL’s Game Pass – so most Sunday evenings I’ll be watching like on my Desktop computer – or more likely these days – on my iPad. Should I be otherwise engaged (for example during the Sunday evening of the Labour Party Conference, I can watch later. Being the total nerd that I am, I will have my recently purchased “2012 Official NFL Record and Fact Book” at my side.

I also have on my iPhone and iPad the “NFL ’12” and “Official Redskins Feedr” Apps – and of course – as is my practice – I read the sports news in the Washington Post (also through an iPad App.

What is it that I find interesting about this game? It was the references to American Football in political speeches which first attracted my interest (Nixon and Reagan often made references!), but I enjoy the strategic aspects of the game – (hopefully) marching up the field using a series of carefully planned moves – each team trying to outsmart the other. In many ways so much like politics. I even keep my own “playbook” – plays that have been used in Parliament, and particularly Congress (where the scope for innovative procedural tactics is much greater) in order to advance or halt legislative progress.



Are you an American Football fan? Which team do you support? If you'd like to tell fellow readers of Washminster what attracts you to the game - or why you support a particular team - drop me a short piece on jdavidmorgan@washminster.com - which I can then repost here.

The healthcare debate

I've been spending a lot of time in bookshops around Washington DC - and have brought back a few to keep me busy over the coming months. A few days ago I can across one which I hadn't seen before. It is Tom Daschle's "Getting it Done: How Obama and Congress Finally Broke the Stalemate to Make Way for Health Care Reform". Now there are more than enough books on the healthcare debate - and as a UK citizen the ins and outs of what is and isn't covered - has limited attraction. [I benefit from the British NHS, a system which is available to UK citizens on the basis of need - and has well served my family since it was set up over 60 years ago - and none of us have had worry about whether a job loss would mean loss of cover - and we've never had to deal with an insurance company telling us that we've reached the limit of our coverage. ]

But Tom Daschle's book attracted me - because it describes the process by which the legislation made its way through Congress. I will be reading the book in full in the future - but had the opportunity to skim read it whilst taking coffee at the Borders store in the Pentagon Center last week. There's lots there for someone who is interested in how Congress works in practice - and for the historian who seeks to follow the way Congress have evolved since the early 1970s (that would be me!)

Well worth a read.

Senator Specter introduces a Bill

Last week Senator Arlen Specter introduced a Bill on Stem Cell Research to the Senate. You can watch the specch he made - note that he "sought recognition to introduce" the bill.



The Bill has been given the number S.3766. It has two co-sponsors, the Senators from California Senator Boxer and Senator Feinstein. The Bill was read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.

The Bill can be read here

The stages in the legislative process are set out in a Senate "flowchart"

Video on Senate Rules

There is an excellent 42 minute video on the subject of Senate rules at GovNews. It is a presentation and Q&A by Senator Tom Udall.

The video can be accessed here

Riddicks Manual

(reproduced from House of Representatives Committee on Rules Legislative Process Program)

Floyd M. Riddick, Parliamentarian of the Senate from 1964 to 1974, compiled the first version of Riddick’s Senate Procedure in 1981 while serving as its Parliamentarian Emeritus. The current 1992 edition was revised and edited by Alan S. Frumin, Parliamentarian of the Senate for seven years following Floyd Riddick. Topics are presented in chapters arranged alphabetically by subject matter ranging from ‘Adjournment’ to ‘Washington’s Farewell Address’. This format provides an easy to use reference when questions related to the Senate arise.

Riddick’s Manual can be found on the Government Printing Office’s website at:
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/riddick/browse.html