4 ms·

Except Pelosi and many Democrats voted for this as well...

• Retric 9y ago
  Compare the ratio of support from their members, and the parties are not equivalent. Even if there is plenty of support from across the isle to pass these measures. So, if you want to shift parties you need to get into the primary process. One step deeper, there is a lot of popular support in the US for these measures. Nobody wants to face "Did not vote to keep you safe" attack add when that's going to resonate with people.
• tzs 9y ago
  So? As was mentioned in the excerpt from the article I quoted Ryan would not allow the House to consider a compromise from the House Judiciary Committee. How many of those Democrats would have gone for that compromise bill if that had been on the table? We need both privacy and surveillance. The harm from too little privacy tends to manifest on a longer time frame than the harm from too little surveillance, so when considering a good balance between the two is off the table it is understandable one might go for the option that looks like it will be the safest short term. Pelosi is indeed quite aligned with Republicans on surveillance issues. If she had been speaker she probably would have supported the current bill. But would she have blocked consideration of the compromise, like Ryan did? That seems much less likely, because despite Pelosi and a few other Democrats being quite pro-surveillance the fact is that the party as a whole is quite a bit less pro-surveillance than are the Republicans as a whole. She would have had a harder time than Ryan keeping the compromise from being considered because she would be going against the majority of her own party, unlike Ryan.