RNC – Forget About McCain / Save the Filibuster
What a revolting time to be a Republican. The fat lady has started rehearsing on the presidential race and the NRCC has given up any pretense of keeping the losses in House of Representatives to a respectable margin of defeat.
Back In July, I wrote the following:
“It is not a question of if the Democrat nominee will win but how the coattail effect will impact House and Senate races across the country. The Democrats could easily pick up 15 to 17 House seats, and with the indictment of Senator Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), possibly reach 60 members in the U.S. Senate. The cloture threshold would be in effect and allow the Democrats to control the possibility of a Republican filibuster in the 111th Congress.”
According to Real Clear Politics, there are five states that are very competitive and within the margin of error including Alaska, Kentucky, Minnesota, Mississippi and North Carolina. If the Democrats win all of these Senate seats and reach 60 votes, the ball game is over.
Our system of government, as John Adams described it, is necessary that “ambition must be made to counter ambition.” If the Democrats achieve a filibuster-proof super-majority in the United States, there will be no checks or balances in the national government for the next two or maybe four years.
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14 Responses to “RNC – Forget About McCain / Save the Filibuster”
OTOH, given the nature of the current Republican leadership I would not expect the weapon of the filibuster to be wielded responsibly. I think they would just block item after item in hopes of painting the Democrats as unable to “get things done” in the 2010 elections. There would be no thought whatsoever of the good of the country.
Let's make sure I understand. Is this the same filibuster that the Republicans wanted to eliminate whenever the Dems threatened to use it. The same filibuster that the Republican leadership said was undemocratic. Just wanted to make sure that the Republicans (and yourself) weren't talking about some other kind of filibuster. Just wanted to make sure that the Republicans weren't being hypocrites, yet again.
continuum
It is also the same filibuster (and threat of same) that the Republicans have been using for the last two years apparently under the news radar most of the time.
It's a pity the republicans seem incapable of devoting even a fraction of their energy examining their own abysmal 8 year record as they spend worrying about how the democrats might wield power should they make significant gains.
Frankly, after all the crap the Republicans passed through Congress and had signed into law during the first 6 years of the Bush II debacle, I have no problem with the Dems holding a fillibuster-proof super majority. If it helps them reverse the terrible course set by Republicans from 2000 to 2006, it's well worth it.
I don't understand the problem, there hasn't been any checks or balances in the national government for the last eight years.
Now is the time for Democrats to clean up the Republican Mess.
JSpencer: It's a pity the republicans seem incapable of devoting even a fraction of the energy examining their own 8 year record of failure as they spend worrying about how the democrats might wield power should they make significant gains.
If I were to percolate my discontent with the GOP down to one thing it would be that — the disinclination toward self-reflection. Instead, it always seems to be someone else's fault. It's the media. It's the professors. It's ACORN. It's the immigrants. It's Reid and Pelosi. It's poor people wanting too much. It's whatever. The GOP needs to get some pride, some appreciation of responsibility, and start talking about what they are rather than what they aren't.
In the mean time they jettison anyone who does speak out about the need for self-reflection. They're turn-coats, RINOs, pinkos in business suits. Only purists need apply — and that without any real examination of what “purity” even means. A fiscal conservative who opposes an expanding military gets ejected. A security conservative who won't speak out against gay marriage, or abortion gets ejected. A social conservative who cares too much about poor people gets ejected. Entire swaths of America have become un-American. Intellectuals are un-American. Scientists are un-American. Anyone too close to Washington is un-American. So not only do you need to be a purist (whatever that means), you have to be a small town Joe Six Pack purist. Armani suits and Gucci shoes, apparently, are just fine though.
We already know the obvious, but when it comes to “news,” here you are:
http://people-press.org/report/463/media-wants-…
As for who's active and smells blood, versus who's not and sees failure:
http://people-press.org/report/464/campaign-eng…
The GOP, the party, is dysfunctional, a polyglot of liberalism's rejectees and targets of worse behavior from the Left. American conservatism is dysfunctional, unsure what it wants to be (or which branch among those all claiming to be “conservative” should dominate), and is neither coherent nor sufficiently attractive as an alternative to the Democratic Party and modern liberalism (the 1930s-onward modern welfare state in place of constitutional federalism; additional ambitious and plunges into radicalism in the 1960s), which has engineered a system of positive-electoral-feedback perpetual beneficiaries. The most the GOP has done is expressed (almost only words, not deeds, of) opposition to this.
I'll ignore the hypocritical charges of anti-science (the Left has been anti-science and anti-development, as they remain to this day with their idiotic opposition to nuclear power, for example, as well as rational near-term alternatives to our current energy supply system) and other weak mischaracterizations that amount to little more than pathetic propaganda (part of a hugely uneven treatment the Right gets in contrast to the Left).
“If the Democrats achieve a filibuster-proof super-majority in the United States, there will be no checks or balances in the national government for the next two or maybe four years.”
“Fusion of powers” is not a problem when the Democrats are in charge, according to PC gospel. Furthermore, “divided government” is only a problem when there is Republican opposition to what would otherwise be an unstoppable Democratic monolith of failing that, some other kind of juggernaut, as happened in the 1980s.
A _true_ situation with Washington that has an imperial nature or character is perfectly legitimate if it is the Democrats that have unchecked power. That's gospel.
My recommendation is to find the Democratic Blue Dogs and do your best to make them influential. They are the most likely source of fiscal conservatism IF the Dems do have a landslide.
DLS, I usually find your posts to be interesting for one reason or another, but your comedy posts are the best!
Please not that the filibuster the repubs wanted to end, the “nuclear” option as it was called, was only about voting for appointees not for legislation. So it is not the same thing we are discussing at all.
Tony – one correction. The quote Ambition must be made to counteract ambition., is actually from Federalist #51, penned by James Madison. It is a great document that shows the clear intent of the founders when they built checks, balances and separation of power into the Constitution. What they did not anticipate, is how single party rule undermines these constitutional protections. I have been beating the divided government drum for two years on my blog. I voted for John Kerry to get divided government in 2004 and lost. I supported a straight Dem ticket in 2006 to get divided government and won. This year I will vote to re-elect divided government by supporting John McCain.
This scholarly article from a Constitutional lawyer puts more than a little academic cred behind the divided government thesis. The only way to re-elect Divided Government in 2008, is elect John McCain for President. It is the right thing to do.