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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSenators allowed to drink ONLY water or milk on Senate floor during impeachment
Link to tweet
Matt Laslo ✔ @MattLaslo
Sen. Rick Scott tells me the rules only allow senators to drink water and milk on the Senate floor during the impeachment trial
12:15 PM - Jan 21, 2020
Whaaaa???
On edit: this is normal:
Link to tweet
Olivia Nuzzi @Olivianuzzi
Replying to @MattLaslo
Arent these the rules all the time, not just for impeachment?
Olivia Nuzzi @Olivianuzzi
Update: I am correct.
12:31 PM - Jan 21, 2020
Some on twitter are joking that, at the stroke of midnight, they should crack a bottle.
The milk rule almost killed Sen. Bob LaFollette Sr in 1908:
A Deadly Drink
May 29, 1908
Consider this setting for a dastardly deed! The time is midnight. The place is the floor of the Senate. The Chamber's interior temperature has reached 90 degrees. The Senate is ready to wrap up its business in order to adjourn from June until December. Last-minute legislation awaits final passage. But, for the past 12 hours, the physically fit freshman senator from Wisconsin, Robert M. La Follette, has been conducting a filibuster hoping to block adoption of a conference report. Two years earlier, Senator La Follette had delivered a maiden speech that lasted three days and filled 148 pages of the Congressional Record.
On May 29, 1908, La Follette was at it again. Several dozen irritated members stood by to answer quorum calls. Nothing would have pleased La Follette more, in the classic tradition of filibusterers, than to catch the Senate without a quorum. This would have allowed him to hold the floorunder the practices of that eraduring extended quorum calls, conserving his energy as the clock ticked toward adjournment.
La Follette's successful requests for quorum calls29 in allprompted the Senate to affirm that a further quorum call would not be in order until some "business" had taken place. Mere "debate" would no longer be considered the kind of business necessary to trigger another quorum call. This left La Follette with but one optionkeep talking.
To maintain the strength necessary to continue until morning, the senator sent a page to the Senate restaurant for a turkey sandwich and a glass of milk fortified with eggs. Kitchen workers, none too happy to be held into the early morning hours, may have taken a little extra time in filling the senator's order. Perhaps they let the eggnog sit unrefrigerated.
Shortly before 1 a.m. on May 30, La Follette took his first sip. The eggnog did not taste right. He took a larger sip and promptly thrust it aside. Soon, he experienced digestive difficulties. A subsequent analysis revealed that the mixture contained enough toxic bacteria to kill anyone consuming the entire glass. Tired, drenched in perspiration, and feeling increasingly ill, the iron-willed La Follette continued speaking until after 7 a.m., when a colleague arrived to relieve him. Although his filibuster subsequently failed, La Follette set a single-speech record of 18 hours and 23 minutes. His record would stand for nearly half a century. Who had a motive to poison the senator? Perhaps the kitchen staffor, at least half the Senate. Most likely, however, the culprit was the searing heat that, until the 1950s, usually guaranteed senators the summer away from Washington. History has been good to Robert La Follette. Recently, former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky characterized him as "among the most admired and forceful United States senators ever to hold office
ehrnst
(32,640 posts)forgotmylogin
(7,530 posts)Nothing wrong with milk, but not sitting in a glass for hours.
Mitch is just trying to make the trial inconvenient for everyone.
Do they also have to raise their hand and enter a 'potty break' into the Congressional record?
dewsgirl
(14,961 posts)Im surprised it's not just water.
forgotmylogin
(7,530 posts)dewsgirl
(14,961 posts)Link to tweet
?s=20
ChubbyStar
(3,191 posts)TheBlackAdder
(28,211 posts).
.
ChubbyStar
(3,191 posts)are readily available too! Mouth breathing fuckers love them!
bunny planet
(10,875 posts)what no kool-aid
Lars39
(26,116 posts)hlthe2b
(102,357 posts)MoonRiver
(36,926 posts)Mike 03
(16,616 posts)without his Cemetery Hill whiskey.
getagrip_already
(14,837 posts)No caffeine is a bizarre rule.
hlthe2b
(102,357 posts)(or my own favorite, Jet-Alert... )
TruckFump
(5,812 posts)[link:?format=750w|
ChubbyStar
(3,191 posts)SoCalNative
(4,613 posts)Russian vodka would be allowed. Maybe even compulsory.
dewsgirl
(14,961 posts)SamKnause
(13,110 posts)Water; yuck.
shanti
(21,675 posts)SamKnause
(13,110 posts)I rarely drink it.
I can't remember the last time I drank water.
Bayard
(22,149 posts)McConnell trying to regulate every little thing.
Dennis Donovan
(18,770 posts)I didn't know when I posted the OP at first. I didn't self delete because it's still one of those "fun facts" I didn't know.
jimfields33
(15,948 posts)Yes they drink it there but they cant even do that during this. Im worried about senators with diabetes and other ailments. Some cant go that long without food. Their blood sugar will drop like a rock.
shanti
(21,675 posts)And they get a choice of still or sparkling water?
hunter
(38,326 posts)moondust
(20,006 posts)Cheating scoundrels filling their water bottles with Stoli?
Ilsa
(61,698 posts)was allowed, but no caffeinated drinks.
I wonder if the senators can pour those little tubes of high caffeine energy drinks into their water?
BlueTsunami2018
(3,503 posts)What are they, children?
Come to think of it.....
unblock
(52,317 posts)same goes for orange juice.
apparently ordinary water doesn't have enough nutrients in it to keep your body interested, so it passes it through before it has a chance to fully absorb it all.
milk and o.j. slow the process down enough to absorb more, but not so much extra stuff to have much of a diuretic effect.
forgotmylogin
(7,530 posts)smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)What's wrong with a smoothie or a health drink to keep their energy up and their blood sugar level. Or some iced tea or another soft drink? Milk is disgusting and it smells, especially if it's been sitting around. I can't even stand to watch someone drink a glass of milk.
The substance just makes me want to gag. Is this an actual hard and fast rule or just an arbitrary tradition that has been imposed by some control freaks among them?