American Politics Thread 2013: I'm a cool Rodham grandma in the USA

this dances music sounds god

Senate Democrats Poised to Block Filibusters of Presidential Picks

“We’re not bluffing,” said one senior aide who has spoken with Mr. Reid directly and expects a vote on Thursday, barring any unforeseen breakthrough on blocked judges.

...

Mr. Reid has said he supports keeping intact the minority party’s ability to filibuster controversial Supreme Court nominees.

Let the good times roll!

Dumb question: if the rules can be changed, what's to stop anyone from changing the rules back?

Senator on the radio had a good point. Right now, the 67 needed to break a filibuster is arbitrary. He pointed out how there's nothing stopping a majority party from making that number an equally arbitrary and even harder to break 80 or 90 (for hyperbole's sake). So he said that for better or for worse, 51 - a simple majority - would at least be consistent and fair. When asked by the interviewer how he would feel if Republicans used the same power to override a filibuster and push through a Supreme Court justice who would upset the court's relative balance, he basically called it tough medicine, a lesson to be learned that elections have consequences, and that anyone voting for Republicans shouldn't be surprised to see them voting like Republicans. There's something to that.

They can change the rules back, but there doesn't seem to be much of a reason for the majority to empower the minority.

It wouldn't surprise me if the Republicans will further change the rules to include filibuster on Supreme Court nominees. I really don't know why Reid would shy away for that now while he has the chance.

Reid is shying away on the Supreme Court nominee as part of typical Democrat "reasonable adult" standard. Invariably, just as the Republicans broke the Gang of 12 Rules, they will do whatever they want that is in their own best interests when/if they control the Senate

Speaking of control of the Senate, the Dems's Senatorial Campaign Committe is getting worried. Here's part of an email they sent (obviously this to try to raise more funds but still...)

Nate Silver calls North Carolina the “tipping point state in the Senate battle” and says it is the GOP's “best option to…[win] a 51-49 Senate majority.” And this is alarming: a wave of attacks from the Koch brothers has shrunk North Carolina Democrat Kay Hagan’s polling lead from 15 points to just two.

Now, the Kochs are going for the kill by launching “one of their largest ad buys to date” to take the lead there and across the country. Early attacks of this size are unheard of -- they’re funneling $2 million into North Carolina ALONE.

vote with your dollars, people, it's all that counts

Reid should change the rules to make it illegal for the Republicans to control the senate. Problem: solved!

Honestly, if they just made filibuster-ers stand there and babble like they did in the good ol' days, I think we'd not only see fewer filibusters, we'd also weed out some of the weaker-hearted politicians, who'd keel over on the floor mid-babble. Wouldn't that be an easier rule to change? What is the argument against once again forcing people to stand up or shut up? Is the argument that that would be ... too hard? Too inconvenient? At the very least, we might get another cable channel out of it.

86 presidential nominees filibustered prior to 2009, 82 since? nice

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQv_vgcvqiM

An alternative, uh, reading:

So is the Republican use of the filibuster today simply fair turn-around — with Democrats in no position to complain when Republicans use tactics they themselves introduced? If so, that would be enough to illustrate the hypocrisy of today’s Democratic protests. But that’s not what’s at issue here. In the D.C. Circuit matter, which has driven Senator Reid to the nuclear option, Republicans are not raising ideological objections to Obama’s nominees — as Democrats did when they filibustered Bush’s picks. Their objection, rather, is that these judges are not needed, because the workload of the court is so light. In fact, speaking of hypocrisy, Democrats, in the minority in the 109th Congress, used that very rationale to urge Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter in a July 2006 letter not to confirm any additional Bush nominees to the D.C. Circuit — and none was confirmed after that letter from Senators Leahy, Feinstein, Schumer, and Durbin was sent, all of whom are still on the committee. Yet now, when the court’s workload is even lighter, Democrats cry foul when Republicans point that out.

the courts workload is so light that they have to call in a bunch of ostensibly retired conservative judges to rule on stuff!

Plus the court's workload has been statistically analyzed by other folks who say it has not changed much: when the Republicans happily reached a deal to get nominees on that court.

im sure everyone is a total hypocrite who cares the filibuster is garbage nuke the senate

Nuking the senate leaves us only the house and its tea party yahoos making laws.

nuke the house

also

http://24.media.tumblr.com/b7cd62f4c9fd440bc0b105dc7ba2275f/tumblr_mpfqkpmvvv1qm3ypqo1_500.gif

so NPR had this story on the bill to 'fix' federal IT:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2013/11/21/246345010/how-healthcare-gov-is-giving-a-once-obscure-bill-a-boost

Nuking the legislative and executive branches leaves us with "state's rights" ascendant again. Jim Crow, anyone?

listen we can just keep nuking its really not a problem

(**winks at lagoon & shoots him a finger gun**)

and.... it's done

awesome

who gives a shit

President Christie

GIVE'EM HELL HARRY

lol u guys so crazy

otm:

Norm Ornstein, a congressional scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, told TPM that Republicans forced Harry Reid to "go nuclear" after his Democratic majority took the historic step Thursday and ended the filibuster for executive nominees and non-Supreme Court judicial nominees.

"For whatever reason, the Republicans decided to go nuclear first, with this utterly unnecessary violation of their own agreement and open decision to block the president from filling vacancies for his entire term, no matter how well qualified the nominees," Ornstein told TPM in an email. "It was a set of actions begging for a return nuclear response."

He also speculated that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) secretly wanted Democrats to go nuclear so he could use the same tactic to end the filibuster entirely if and when Republicans takes the majority.

"McConnell's threat, it seems to me, makes clear the strategy: let Dems take the first step, and we will then bear no blame when we entirely blow up the Senate's rules after we take all the reins of power," he said.

I have mixed feelings about this. basically the Senate doesn't work the way it used to and they need to figure out some new rules. I guess.

gonna be awhile before GOP has the Senate or the Presidency again so who knows what's gonna happen

ya I would bet on democrats ending the filibuster altogether before the republicans do

my guess next time you see one party control both houses and the presidency the filibuster will be bye bye

I mean whether McConnell is even gonna be in the Senate another term is a legit question so if he has a "grand plan" it sort of doesn't matter (yet)

it's just too bad democrats didn't come around last time that happened (and too bad ted kennedy died) otherwise we'd have a much better healthcare law right now and cap and trade and prob all sorts other cool laws

Reid did what McConnell was gonna do anyway. I don't see anything in the Con-stee-tution adducing the filibustering of executive nominees.

http://pc-museum.com/046-imsai8080/wargames-05.jpg

Reid did what McConnell was gonna do anyway.

― the objections to Drake from non-REAL HIPHOP people (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, November 21, 2013 1:30 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lot of thinkpieces being written right now willfully ignoring this obvious point

think this is kinda rad & necessary because Jesus fuckin Christ this generation of Republicans

good simple american folks

how much longer do we think tea party people stay around

old people live a long time these days

true but aren't most of the tea party representatives fairly young?

non-whites die faster

well they're just the spriteful political entrepreneurs making use of the opportunity

Under the circumstances, it was the only sensible response. The circumstances were totally fucked up, though, so this response inevitably has some coloration of being fucked up, too.

tea party will be around for a while, tea party has been around for a while, its just the populist core of the gop with the moderate husk pulled off

the filibuster was the thing that was fucked up

well they're just the spriteful political entrepreneurs making use of the opportunity

surely you mean spiteful

anyway the thing that people never remember about 'the tea party' is that these people didn't just like, come out of the forest one day, these people were knocking on doors for dubya etc etc

xps

sprites have a bad temper, seriously

never would've thought reid would go nuclear before iran did