EXCEPT THE CONSTITUTION FORBIDS CRUEL AND UNUSUAL PUNISHMENT:

‘Monster’ Spending Bills (Susan Davis, 10/30/07, Wall Street Journal: Washington Wire)

There is an advocacy group for pretty much everything in Washington, and Readthebill.org is no exception. The group’s singular mission is to advocate that members of Congress read the annual spending bills before they pass them into law. In particular, Readthebill.org is targeting the now common practice of rolling the bills into massive “omnibus” spending measures, in a 50-page report being released this morning entitled “Monsters in Congress: How Republicans and Democrats allowed 13 inherently unreadable omnibus appropriations bills to devour deliberative democracy.”

The group states that they aren’t advocating on the substance of the spending bills, but that those 13 bills were so massive, and brought to the floor for passage with so little time for consideration, that they make for bad process.