I’m not sure why some Democrats in the Senate enjoy giving the Republican minority effective veto power over their entire agenda, but according to Politico that seems to be the case among senior leadership.
There’s no deal yet on how to change Senate filibuster rules, but Democrats and Republicans are finding common ground in two other areas: ending the practice of so-called secret holds and smoothing the way for presidential nominees.
Senate leaders from both parties are still trying to avoid a drawn-out fight over changing the rules to make it harder to filibuster…
…Senior Democrats hope a group of junior party members, led by New Mexico Sen. Tom Udall, will not carry through with a threat to try to allow changes to Senate rules by a simple majority of 51 votes, rather than a two-thirds majority of 67 votes.
The only real justification is that it the effort won’t succeed so trying just sets a bad precedent.
While Udall appears to lack the votes, a number of Democrats fear an effort to do that could set a damaging precedent if Republicans regain the majority after 2012.
But, why the hell won’t it succeed? Why doesn’t Udall have the votes? Look. Getting nominees confirmed is nice. Getting rid of secret holds is good. But the problem is that the Republicans won’t vote for ANYTHING that doesn’t conform EXACTLY with THEIR agenda. If you want to pass Mitch McConnell’s priorities, then by all means keep the 60-vote requirement for all spending bills. We’ll gut PBS and NPR and foreign aid and money for the United Nations and money for transportation and schools, and gut the federal workforce. We’ll do that not because we want to or because we think it’s good policy, but because the majority would prefer to keep the present system that turns 59 senators into the minority.
Ultimately, the president is the one who will suffer the most. But, along with that, all the people who voted for him and believe in his ability to lead will suffer. This system is ridiculous and it’s a goddamned joke (albeit, a perfectly predictable joke) that the Democrats don’t have the votes to change the filibuster rule in a way that will enable to govern as a majority.
I still ask the same question Dday asks, which is that do these Democrats seriously think Republicans will stand around and let archaic rules get in their way?
That’s true, too, but they haven’t done it in the past. I think it is beside the point. Yes, if it fails then all you have done is create a bad precedent. But the problem is that it would fail. Why?
Getting rid of the filibustering the motion to proceed is essential. I will never understand the egos and absurd selfishness of the Democratic Senate caucus.
OOOOH, OOOH, MR. KOTTER!!! MISTAH KOTTER!!!!!!
It’s because those democrats are on the same side as the republicans, in bed with the same corporations and interests. They have the exact same agenda.
I’m not talking about ALL democrats here. You know who I mean. If you reformed the filibuster, how would Max baucus prevent a bill that hurts his constituents (and by that i don’t mean people from Montana, I mean the health insurance industry). How would Rockefeller protect mountaintop removal and the coal industry?
If there is one thing which is evident in all this wrangling it is that the unspoken first rule of the Senate is:
“We must not allow for easier passage of things which would help actual people at the expense of those who give us money”
bingo.
it’s not a very hard question, really. What’s hard is admitting that that’s the answer, that our “leaders” are self-interested frauds.
yes, that is the unspoken reality.
that’s why I haven’t been blogging about politics. I feel as if talking about politics these days is like talking about the merits of a band-aid with a Sponge-Bob or Muppet Babies print, when the patient has a sucking chest wound.
required reading.
Not all of them. That’s what makes the politics so difficult, as compared with just sitting around bitching. Our leaders have always been self-interested frauds to one degree or another. And yet we have managed to accomplish good and important stuff. The difference now is that, as the poet says, the best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.
What are the situations that changing the filibuster rule would help us with now? The rationale for changing the rules was clear when the progressive legislation that was passed by the House would get filibustered in the Senate. But having list or majority in the House, what legislation are we expecting that House Republicans would agree to that Senate Republicans wouldn’t?
they need to grow a damn spine
One minor question. And Politico, which has an agenda to support the GOP, knows this inside information how? Did Joe Lieberman talk to them?
Probably posted this before about how the National Socialist Democrat and Workers Party took over the government of Germany as a minor party from the war crimes commission investigation:
The parliamentary battle of the NSDAP had the single purpose of destroying the parliamentary system from within through its own methods. It was necessary above all to make formal use of the possibilities of the party-state system but to refuse real cooperation and thereby to render the parliamentary system, which is by nature dependent upon the responsible cooperation of the opposition, incapable of action.
Ernst Rudolf Huber (witness) From the Chief Counsel for the Prosecution of Axis Criminality Volume I, Chapter VII 1946.
http://thegallopingbeaver.blogspot.com/2010/06/bairds-of-this-world-get-away-with.html
And, it’s official.