Lawmaker: I Approved That Evil Un-Environmental Fracking By . . . Pushing the Wrong Button!
Well. If her intent was to push the red buttton instead of the green one, who are we to give effect to the button she actually pressed?
State House lawmakers have apparently accidentally legalized fracking in North Carolina, due to a deciding vote one Democrat says was a mistake.
Rep. Becky Carney, D-Mecklenburg, says she did not intend to cast the key vote that overrode the governor’s veto of the bill.
The vote was 72-47, exactly the number needed for an override. Without Carney’s vote, the veto would have been sustained.
Carney characterized her vote as “very accidental.”
Maybe it was.
Or maybe she had a change of heart after seeing that her vote was actually the deciding vote.
Carney pointed out that she has voted against fracking in the past, and said she spent the day lobbying other Democrats to uphold the veto of Senate Bill 820.
“And then I push the green button,” she said.
Just after the vote, Carney’s voice could be heard on her microphone, saying “Oh my gosh. I pushed green.”
Inexplicable, eh? Unless she did a bit of logrolling, and promised this unlikely vote in return for a favor from another lawmaker.
Absent a compelling confession, we’ll likely never know.
Which is why I claim that, for purposes of a publicly passed law, we have to go with what lawmakers actually do — and not what they later claim their intent was.
UPDATE: From 11B40 in comments, referring to the fact that the lawmaker’s buttons were red and green:
Please, someone tell me the woman doesn’t have a driver’s license.