Kennedy's seat to turn Republican

[Drake Tungsten]

Do majorities ever stare down a fillibuster? Say they dare the Republicans to shut down the Senate for other business and see who blinks first?

It hasn't worked like that since 1975...

This change ... was not the result of, say, a formal amendment, but a procedural rule adopted in 1975: a revision of Senate Rule 22, which was the old cloture rule. Before 1975, it took two-thirds of the Senate to end a filibuster, but it was the “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” filibuster: if senators wanted to stop a vote, they had to bring in the cots and the coffee and read from Grandma’s recipe for chicken soup until, unshaven, they keeled over from their own rhetorical exhaust.

For the record, nothing like Senate Rule 22 appears in the Constitution, nor was there unlimited debate until Vice President Aaron Burr presided over the Senate in the early 1800s. In 1917, after a century of chaos, the Senate put in the old Rule 22 to stop unlimited filibusters. Because it was about stopping real, often distressing, floor debate, one might have been able to defend that rule under Article I, Section 5 of the Constitution, which says, “Each house may determine the rule of its proceedings.”

As revised in 1975, Senate Rule 22 seemed to be an improvement: it required 60 senators, not 67, to stop floor debate. But there also came a significant change in de facto Senate practice: to maintain a filibuster, senators no longer had to keep talking. Nowadays, they don’t even have to start; they just say they will, and that’s enough. Senators need not be on the floor at all. They can be at home watching Jimmy Stewart on cable. Senate Rule 22 now exists to cut off what are ghost filibusters, disembodied debates.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/11/opinion/11geoghegan.html

[Dinner]

They should but almost never do. The brave answer to the Republican attempts to gum up 90% of the legislation over the last year would have been to dare them to do it and then let the American people see just how obstructionist the Republicans really are.

But since Reid is a weak little weinnie he just tables bills and doesn't challenge much of anything.

WRT Mass, the polls that come out in the next two days will give a good indication if Obama's campaign appearance and the media blitz has started to shift things towards Coakley at all.

[Drake Tungsten]

They should but almost never do. The brave answer to the Republican attempts to filibuster 90% of the legislation over the last year would have been to dare them to do it and then let the American people see just how obstructionist the Republicans really are.

Wrong again!

[Dinner]

Actually true. Reid should hold the cloture vote and make them go on record for being obstructionists but instead Reid likes to take an informal poll and quietly table things.

[notyoueither]

Do majorities ever stare down a fillibuster? Say they dare the Republicans to shut down the Senate for other business and see who blinks first?

It hasn't worked like that since 1975...

This change ... was not the result of, say, a formal amendment, but a procedural rule adopted in 1975: a revision of Senate Rule 22, which was the old cloture rule. Before 1975, it took two-thirds of the Senate to end a filibuster, but it was the “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” filibuster: if senators wanted to stop a vote, they had to bring in the cots and the coffee and read from Grandma’s recipe for chicken soup until, unshaven, they keeled over from their own rhetorical exhaust.

For the record, nothing like Senate Rule 22 appears in the Constitution, nor was there unlimited debate until Vice President Aaron Burr presided over the Senate in the early 1800s. In 1917, after a century of chaos, the Senate put in the old Rule 22 to stop unlimited filibusters. Because it was about stopping real, often distressing, floor debate, one might have been able to defend that rule under Article I, Section 5 of the Constitution, which says, “Each house may determine the rule of its proceedings.”

As revised in 1975, Senate Rule 22 seemed to be an improvement: it required 60 senators, not 67, to stop floor debate. But there also came a significant change in de facto Senate practice: to maintain a filibuster, senators no longer had to keep talking. Nowadays, they don’t even have to start; they just say they will, and that’s enough. Senators need not be on the floor at all. They can be at home watching Jimmy Stewart on cable. Senate Rule 22 now exists to cut off what are ghost filibusters, disembodied debates.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/11/op...geoghegan.html

I see. So since any one Senator could do it, they skip making him speak 'til he's horse and proceed straight to a vote on closure.

So, the nuclear option would be to amend Senate rules to allow 50 votes to invoke closure. Perhaps that would not be a bad idea...

[Ben Kenobi]

That's dirty but technically legal; perversely it would probably result in a better bill since they'd only need 50 votes plus the VP's vote instead of the full 60 votes.

Suppose the Republicans did this? Would there be much gnashing of teeth about the dictator Bush? Then I don't see why Democrats would go down with the sinking ship. If it were a good bill then it would pass easily. That it hasn't passed despite a democrat supermajority, is evidence that the bill is a giant turd.

When you have to bribe democrats for their support that says everything you need to know about the bill.

[Kuciwalker]

If it's any consolation to you, the Dems can pass this without 60, if necessary.

Not easily. The House would have to pass the Senate bill unchanged (including the tax on Cadillac plans that they already had to alter to get union support) to avoid another cloture vote in the Senate.

I suspect a lot of the necessary modifications could be passed through reconciliation. So they pass the Senate bill through the House with the promise that the relevant provisions won't actually stand.

[Drake Tungsten]

I suspect a lot of the necessary modifications could be passed through reconciliation. So they pass the Senate bill through the House with the promise that the relevant provisions won't actually stand.

This is indeed a possibility. We'll never find out how exactly it would work in practice, however, as Coakley is going to win.

[GePap]

From everything I have read, Coakley has been a terrible campaigner, uninspiring, made an ad in which Massachusetts was misspelled (I misspell things all the time, but if its going to go on Television, for god's sake, use spellcheck!), got started late to begin with after the primary..and lost the debate with Brown. So if she wins, it will be purely because she has a (D) next to her name, and the GOTV op. this weekend was able to scare enough Dems. into believing that it would be a catatrophe to let Brown win that they come out. While I do think that, as I said before, the Dems. will pull it through, its not a race I would put money on.

[Felch]

They should but almost never do. The brave answer to the Republican attempts to gum up 90% of the legislation over the last year would have been to dare them to do it and then let the American people see just how obstructionist the Republicans really are.

The party in power is at fault. Maybe not in reality, but in public perception.

After all, think about how many people in this country have no idea how Congress works. Then think about convincing them that the reason the party in power failed to deliver is that the minority abused a procedural rule, and imagine how quickly those eyes glaze over.

Most people will blame the Democrats and Reid was smart enough to realize that.

[Drake Tungsten]

You tell 'em, Keith.

[DinoDoc]

This makes me

[Dinner]

Final poll show Brown up by 5.

[Guynemer]

It never ceases to amaze just how good the Democrats are at absolutely blowing themselves up the second they gain even the slightest of advantages.

[Cookie Monster]

Coakley and the Communist agenda must be stopped at all costs.