Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) had a disheartening reaction when asked if he would use the power he wields to bring House-passed bills before the Senate: he laughed.

Reid tried to excuse his partisanship with explanations of Senate procedures: “I can give you a long list of things we haven’t done… Every time you come to a bill [on the Senate floor] you have to have a Motion to Proceed [and] it takes about 10 days, and it limits what we can get done here.” He laughed when asked when he would deal with the House bills, saying, “some time is a long time, I guess.”

But Reid complained that House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) wouldn’t deal with several Senate-passed bills, especially the Senate bill that would extend tax cuts on those making under $250,000 per year:

Speaker Boehner knows or should know that the middle class tax help that we have to pass would sail through the House of Representatives. Democrats would overwhelmingly vote for it. I would doubt that there would be any Democrat that would vote against it.

According to House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, 40 bills have not been called up by Reid in the Senate, including the Cut, Cap and Balance plan, Paul Ryan’s 2013 budget, and GOP proposals to avoid the fiscal cliff and start tax reform.