Food "Safety" Bill Passed by Lame Duck Perfidy

Arrgghhh."In Sunday-evening surprise, Senate passes food safety legislation":

The Senate unexpectedly approved food safety legislation by voice vote Sunday evening, rescuing a bill that floated in limbo for weeks because of a clerical error.

Attempts like this are to be expected by lame duck legislators, a concept that in this day and age can and needs to be done away with. The House and Senate should be permanently closed before election day and the new House and Senate then seated within a week or two of the election.

Herein lies the perfidy:

Democrats first attempted to attach the food safety bill to the two-and-a-half-month spending measure but Republicans balked because they wanted to keep that measure clean, according to Senate aides.

Republicans, however, later agreed to pass it by voice vote

Why bother separating the two bills if you're going to approve both of them? I've yet to find an explanation for this separation. It make no sense to me, unless they are anticipating a second vote whereby they can vote against one or the other bill, yet my understanding is that the food bill goes to the President if (when) the House passes it.

By this the current Senate Republicans have promulgated further intrusion of government regulation into private affairs thus showing themselves to be no different than Democrats in this regard. A pox on their house.