Originally Posted by
Nucflash
The standalone bills in the House and Senate are basically intended to smokescreen the process and to promote the PR campaign (Graham’s press conference, etc). They don’t have a chance. Clearly, it is MUCH more simple to tack something like this on to a more important bill of massive proportion than to pass it in both houses and have it signed by Biden as a standalone.
Yes, this. The original bills were PR, recon by fire, and staking some territory for their fellow congress-critters to see. Basically saying "this is what WE care about, so if you want support for YOUR stuff, then our thing had better be in the re-authorization.
It's a complicated dance, as I learned to my dismay while working on appropriations in the mil.
Originally Posted by
Nucflash
Now, it just so happens that there is a very senior Delta pilot with the same last name who lives just outside Houston, in the same town in which Congressman Nehls lives, which is in the same county where Nehls was formerly the sheriff. That is also TRUE. Coincidence? I’m certainly not going to post personal information here; you can source that for yourselves.
Even so, the guy's brother (if that's who he is) wasn't going to change things much either way. This is too big to have gone down because some senior boomer called up his brother in congress and asked for a couple more years on the job. I wouldn't strictly rule out that some tiny pork provision could get into some big bill because of somebody's brother but this one is too public with way too many ramifications for that.
Now if the brother had been an airline CEO... that's exactly how we got age 60 in the first place way back when.