Filibuster Fallout

Tuesday, May 24, 2005 Filibuster Fallout Well this is really too much, from FilibusterFrist.com: We are happy - indeed, relieved - that the rules of the Senate, that the nature of the Senate as a deliberative body, have been preserved. We thank Senators McCain, Chafee, Snowe, and Collins for their integrity in coming out against the nuclear option. We appreciate their having put their government above their party. We thank Senators McCain , Graham, Snowe, Collins, DeWine, Chafee, Warner, Leiberman, Landrieu, Nelson, Inouye, Pryor, Salazar, and Byrd for crafting the compromise that preserves our system of checks and balances." Our system of 'checks and balances' resides in the separation of powers concept of the Constitution, not the Senate rules. And the democrats absolutely loathed these hallowed rules when they were in the majority. This newfound love and respect for the Senate rules has certainly turned the once ugly duckling into the beautiful swan, hasn't it. Are you telling me the filibustiers have some kind of fetish for Senate rules? Or, could it be that the Senate rules are now just a brick to be picked up and heaved at the hated George Bush? There are a couple things here that some democrats just don't understand. Irate Republicans saw last Fall's election as a desperately won battle. Our guy, whom we admire, again earned the right to nominate judges for an up-or-down vote, according to the strictures of the Constitution. And, according to the Constitution, he is entitled to an up-or-down vote on 100% of his nominees - not 55%, or 95% or whatever the other various percentages being floated about are. We won fair and square, and we are entitled to the spoils. You guys would claim the same, with relish, had you won. The republicans are not choosing the most inflammatory nominees they can find in order to show the democrats who's who - the republicans truly believe that these are high quality judges that are being vexatiously denied their chance at a hearing. And the Democrats are not entitled to substitute their judgment with the President on who is 'fit' for office without a majority vote in the Senate, period. This had always been Senate practice, until recently. And for republicans, the real capper is the utter lack of party discipline here. Republicans were not defeated by the democrats, they were defeated by republicans, who knew better and put the primacy of Senate rules ahead of the Constitution and Senate tradition as an excuse to curry favor with the press. Also, how can Harry Reid claim any kind of victory here? I thought the filibuster was to be used against the slobbering neothugs Priscilla Owen and Janice Rogers Brown. Weren't their mesozoic views supposed to be a threat to the very foundations of the republic itself? How can Reid possibly let them through and call it 'victory'? Reid let the huns in through the front gates! Update: I went over to DU for a jaunt, and from what I could tell they are too clueless to figure out if this is a victory for them or not. 12:22 AM | | |