{"id":19994,"date":"2016-02-16T09:10:49","date_gmt":"2016-02-16T17:10:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=19994"},"modified":"2016-02-16T09:10:49","modified_gmt":"2016-02-16T17:10:49","slug":"nuke-the-filibastards-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2016\/02\/16\/nuke-the-filibastards-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Nuke the Filibastards!!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Back when Democrats held control of the Senate, I favored doing away with the filibuster altogether.  Senate Democrats fell slightly short of a complete nuclear option.  I was not a hypocrite when Republicans gained the Senate majority, and have continued to say that filibusters that automatically require a supermajority of 60 votes are a bad idea.  I have no objection to old style filibusters that last only as long as a single senator can speak without a break.  Since Democrats will probably keep the White House and take the Senate in November, we can be sure that Republicans will filibuster all Supreme Court Nominees for years.  Nuke the Filibastards!!<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\"nuclear_blast\"In the wake of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia\u2019s death<\/a>, Republicans abandoned any pretense at decorum and immediately began issuing pronouncements as to how and when Scalia\u2019s seat should be filled\u2014namely, not by Barack Obama<\/a>. If that\u2019s the way they want to play it, then fine: Here\u2019s how Democrats should respond.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no law or Senate rule that can compel Mitch McConnell, the GOP majority leader, to allow a vote to proceed on anyone Obama might nominate. McConnell could choose to wait as long as he likes\u2014indeed, he can wait until Republicans control both the White House and the Senate at the same time. And if that situation doesn\u2019t obtain in 2017, he could delay confirmation hearings until 2021, or 2025\u2014whenever the red stars finally align.<\/p>\n

Could \u201cpolitical pressure\u201d move McConnell any more quickly? Unlikely. Republicans don\u2019t care what the traditional media says about them\u2014hell, they love to claim the press is their enemy\u2014so even if a thousand newspaper editorial boards exhorted McConnell to move forward on a nomination, he\u2019d just shrug his shoulders. And it\u2019s even less likely that any Republican senator would find him or herself threatened for re-election because of GOP recalcitrance. Process stories rarely move voters.<\/p>\n

But there is one force in this universe McConnell does have to respect, and that\u2019s the nuclear option. In 2013, when Senate Democrats eliminated the use of filibusters<\/a> for most presidential appointments, they still kept them in place for Supreme Court nominations. Therefore, even if Republicans lose both the Senate and the White House this November, they could still filibuster any Supreme Court pick that Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders might put forward in 2017.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s why Chuck Schumer, who will replace Harry Reid as leader of the Senate Democrats next year, has to be willing to go full thermonuclear and end the filibuster once and for all if Democrats retake the chamber. In that scenario, a Democratic president could nominate whomever he or she likes, and the Democratic-controlled Senate could confirm that person, with as few as 50 votes since the vice president would break ties.<\/p>\n

Schumer needs to issue this threat now, while it can still credibly be made\u2026<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Inserted from <Daily Kos<\/a>><\/p>\n

I fully agree, except for one thing.  I object to choosing Schumer to succeed Leg Hound Harry.  We need a progressive who is not in Butcher Bibi\u2019s pocket.<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back when Democrats held control of the Senate, I favored doing away with the filibuster altogether.  Senate Democrats fell slightly short of a complete nuclear option.  I was not a hypocrite when Republicans gained the Senate majority, and have continued to say that filibusters that automatically require a supermajority of 60 votes are a bad […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19994"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19994\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}