Syndicated columnist and National Review editor Rich Lowry has this to say about Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's struggle to obtain the supermajority now necessary to pass health care reform:
Reid's struggle getting to 60 makes some liberals fear that America has become "ungovernable." In other words, it isn't putty in their grasping little hands. Unfortunately for them, the Founders created a balky system resistant to precipitate change. It is designed to frustrate ideologically drunken (and perhaps temporary) majorities insistent on passing sweeping, unpopular legislation. Reid's difficulty is exactly the way James Madison would have wanted it.Someone wanna clip that out and save it? I have a feeling it might come in handy at some point in the next decade.
or the last. in case someone besides Lady GaGa is able to time travel any time soon [sic].
Not if your local militia has any say in it.
Balky systems are fine if your name is Balk or you are from the Balkans.
We in the reality-based community have a different definition of unpopular from Mr Lowry.
Sure- you can pass your legislation, just as soon as you lick clean the dingleberries from Joe Lieberman's ass.
Clip it out and save it? Oh, sure, I'll put the clipping right next to the one from three years ago when Republicans were trying to abolish the filabuster.
Hmmmm...I don't recall the filibuster being in the Constitution.
EXACTLY. That shit got made up as a way to frustrate the abolition of slavery.
I will clip it out and save it because I have a feeling this is the format people will use to praise software developers in the future: "[Person's Name] struggle getting [Computer File Name] to open makes some [Plural Noun] fear that [Name of Computer Operating System] has become [Adjective]... [Person's Name] difficulty is exactly the way [Name of Software Developer] would have wanted it."
Someone needs to tell Rich Lowry that the 60-vote thing was never in the original constitution. That rule wasn't adopted until 1917. The "Founders" had nothing to do with it.
This is the same James Madison who advocated a strong Federal Government, right?
Just checking.
(also was a flip-flopper!)
I don't see why people cow to the threat of filibuster; it's hard to see how it would make Republicans look good, as most people associate filibusters with Strom Thurmond block civil rights laws, which is hardly flattering. Why not just call the bluff? It seems win-draw, as a filibuster in no way represents the defeat of a bill.