by hilzoy
"Senate Republicans are now privately threatening to derail the confirmation of key Obama administration nominees for top legal positions by linking the votes to suppressing critical torture memos from the Bush era. A reliable Justice Department source advises me that Senate Republicans are planning to “go nuclear” over the nominations of Dawn Johnsen as chief of the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) in the Department of Justice and Yale Law School Dean Harold Koh as State Department legal counsel if the torture documents are made public. The source says these threats are the principal reason for the Obama administration’s abrupt pull back last week from a commitment to release some of the documents. A Republican Senate source confirms the strategy. It now appears that Republicans are seeking an Obama commitment to safeguard the Bush administration’s darkest secrets in exchange for letting these nominations go forward. (...)
The Justice Department source confirms to me that Brennan has consistently opposed making public the torture memos—and any other details about the operations of the extraordinary renditions program— but this source suggests that concern about the G.O.P.’s roadblock in the confirmation process is the principle reason that the memos were not released. Republican senators have expressed strong reservations about their promised exposure, expressing alarm that a critique of the memos by Justice’s ethics office (Office of Professional Responsibility) will also be released. “There was no 'direct' threat,” said the source, “but the message was communicated clearly—if the OLC and OPR memoranda are released to the public, there will be war.” This is understood as a threat to filibuster the nominations of Johnsen and Koh. Not only are they among the most prominent academic critics of the torture memoranda, but are also viewed as the strongest advocates for release of the torture memos on Obama’s legal policy team.
A Republican Senate staffer further has confirmed to me that the Johnsen nomination was discussed at the last G.O.P. caucus meeting. Not a single Republican indicated an intention to vote for Dawn Johnsen, while Senator John Cornyn of Texas was described as “gunning for her,” specifically noting publication of the torture memos.
That's a lot more plausible than Newsweek's claim that the administration does not want to embarrass countries whose names it could simply redact. It's also completely appalling.
For one thing, the slurs on Koh and Johnsen are vile. They are widely respected legal scholars. For heaven's sake,
Ted Olsen, Bush's solicitor General and his lawyer in Bush v. Gore,
supports Koh:
"The President and the Secretary of State are entitled to have who they want as their legal adviser,” Olson said in a phone interview with me.
Olson was sharply dismissive of claims that Koh is too solicitous of international law. While he declined to discuss the specifics of the case against Koh, much of which has been already debunked, he pushed back hard against the broader claim that Koh’s regard for international law is cause for suspicion.
"I have the greatest respect for Harold Koh," Olson said. "He's a brilliant scholar and a man of great integrity."
Besides the ugliness of the attacks, what the Republicans are doing is really unprecedented. First, the President has traditionally been given deference in the choice of his advisors. If some President wants to have someone in his cabinet, the presumption is that he ought to be able to do so, absent illegality or some sort of manifest incompetence. For the Republican Senators to hold these appointees up not for those reasons, but because they disagree with their policies, is just wrong; if this happened every time a new administration came into office, the opposition party would filibuster half the nominations and no one would never govern at all.
Second, what the Republicans are trying to do is to dictate to the President a matter that is purely his prerogative: deciding whether or not to unclassify documents. This is insane: it's as though Obama threatened to withhold funding for the Senate unless Mitch McConnell fired some staffer he didn't like. [UPDATE:
Adam Serwer points out that it isn't even optional: a judge has ordered that the memos be turned over. Oops: see
here.]
And the combination -- holding appointments hostage while trashing people's reputations in order to keep Obama from making a decision he plainly has the right to make -- is unconscionable.
I am not, in general, a big fan of saying: Republicans: you lost. Get over it. But in this case, I'm going to make an exception. The Republicans do not seem to be willing to allow the President to do things that are plainly his prerogative: appointing the reasonable, qualified, law-abiding people of his choice, deciding which documents should be declassified, and so forth. Any moment now they'll threaten not to pass the budget unless he sets his air conditioner at their preferred temperature.
Two other things: first, I would hope that not every Republican will go along with the idea of filibustering these nominees. They don't have to like them. They don't have to vote for them. But they should recognize the difference between not supporting a nominee and being willing to filibuster him or her. Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, Dick Lugar, and Orrin Hatch: I'm looking at you.
Second: this is one more piece of evidence that the Senate is broken. It needs to change its rules. I support keeping the filibuster for judicial nominations, which are for life. I can imagine a world with a sane opposition in which I would support keeping it generally. But this is not that world. At the very least, the rules need to be changed to force people who want to filibuster to actually be present in the Senate chamber.
I just don't understand why the Republicans insist on remaining The Party Of Bush and The Party Of Torture. You'd think that they'd be happy to see the back of the wildly unpopular President Bush and to denounce his administration as somehow not being a genuinely Republican one (on the theory that Conservatism Cannot Fail, It Can Only Be Failed), and that as part of this they'd be largely indifferent to revelations that redound to Bush's discredit - especially ones that expose the complicity of as many Congressional Democrats as Republicans, in terms of their oversight responsibilities.
Indeed, that last may be a significant part of this: Harry Reid, and for all that I usually love her (and that she has no direct connection to this Senate matter) Nancy Pelosi, were informed of some of the administration's illegal actions (wiretapping, certainly; why not torture?) and if the Republicans are willing to go to the barricades to fight revelations of the past administration's perfidity and with it that of both parties' Congressional Leadership, the Democrats in Congress may not be too strongly inclined to fight the issue.
Posted by: Warren Terra | April 06, 2009 at 02:25 AM
This reminds me of a blog post I happened to see in early February, which accused President Obama of being "too big for his britches".
I think it's fairly clear why the Senators are threatening to do this: "there's just something about that boy I don't like".
The Republican Party isn't just the party of No or the party of Bush or the party of torture: they're also the party that depends on the racist vote*. In opposition now to a black President.
Goodness. What would anyone expect them to do?
*And the homophobic vote. But Obama is willing to be homophobic for them. So that's Okay.
Posted by: Jesurgislac | April 06, 2009 at 02:31 AM
If Horton's account is correct, then this is truly a "this means war" moment for Obama. I can't imagine that the Repubs have any real leverage: if the memos are declassified -- and the senators' motives are outed -- before a filibuster can be instituted, how can they be taken seriously by the media or by voters? Party unity in denying Obama his obviously qualified candidates seems a stretch -- it's time to call their bluff.
Posted by: karl | April 06, 2009 at 02:50 AM
Let me make sure I understand ... US presidents can make de facto war on other countries without Congressional approval but they can't appoint the people they want to execute the policies they were elected to implement unless Congress agrees?
More testimony to the supreme wisdom of the Founding Fathers I guess.
Posted by: Ken Lovell | April 06, 2009 at 04:31 AM
This is a pretty stupid hill for Congressional Republicans to decide to die on. Bush is out, already, they can stop shielding the clown. But that makes sense for "The Stupid Party", and I suppose that Democrats are still defensive about Billy boy, more than eight years out, so it's not a stupidity limited to one party.
I support ending the filibuster for all appointments, I believe Presidents of both parties are entitled to have the Senate actually vote on their nominees. Vote "Hell, NO!", maybe, but vote. The Senate is SUPPOSED to be giving the President "advice and consent", it part of their job. They're not doing that job if they just ignore a nominee.
Legislation, on the other hand, originates with the legislature, they're entitled to act or not act on it as pleases them, so a decision to not act on a bill is perfectly legit.
Posted by: Brett Bellmore | April 06, 2009 at 07:19 AM
I do agree that requiring filibusters to be carried out in person, for real, would be good. The way things are now, filibusters don't bring everything else to a halt, the Senate just moves on to other business, so we're losing most of the benefit we used to get from filibusters gumming up the legislation machine.
Posted by: Brett Bellmore | April 06, 2009 at 07:21 AM
Got a suitable replacement for the legislative filibuster, though: Just require the sponsors of a bill to read it aloud once, over CSPAN, before it's voted on. Who could object to that?
Posted by: Brett Bellmore | April 06, 2009 at 07:48 AM
The Senate is SUPPOSED to be giving the President "advice and consent", it part of their job
Taken to its logical conclusion, this means their "job" is to consent to each confirmation. That can't be right. They aren't "ignoring" the nominee when they filibuster either. They very might spend much more time on them than other times. I'm all for requiring real debate and votes if a filibuster is allowed, the vote that counts just requiring a supermajority to pass.
I'm also not sure if it is "perfectly legit" for a small minority (we can debate on what this means) to block legislative bills. Just because it is "legislative" doesn't mean a filibuster is "perfectly legit" per the text and structure of the Constitution.
Anyway, I'm with Hilzoy overall. I also think the filibuster in some form might be workable -- particularly when judicial checks do not protect many things that once was thought worthy of it in the current big gov't state we have -- but it's hard to convince others since you simply can't trust the current bunch with such raw power without some real change.
I don't think we are going to have a Sandy Levinson (over at Balkinization, this has been a hobbyhorse of his) change any time soon, but I can forsee some new way, some real tweak of the system. Obama's efforts to get bipartisan support for his first judicial nominee fwiw seems to be a good step. Underlining that people like Ted Olsen opposes the minority also helps.
Posted by: Joe | April 06, 2009 at 09:10 AM
I think I'm going to chime in in agreement with everyone else here that it's ridiculous how easy it is to perform a filibuster as the rules are currently constituted. A filibuster *is* useful to prevent a "We got 51%, so suck it," style of government, but there need to be some pretty serious costs and consequences to it, as opposed to, "Oh well, cloture failed, I guess the bill won't pass."
Posted by: Andrew R. | April 06, 2009 at 09:38 AM
At what point (if ever) should the Senate Dems start considering doing away with filibuster. my preferred option is to wait until next term when hopefully it's +60 and change it under existing procedures.
But if they keep blocking Franken, and engage in this sort of extreme ridiculousness, i think it's time to put it on the table.
i'll write a longer post on this, but this is getting completley out of hand
Posted by: publius | April 06, 2009 at 09:54 AM
I assume anyone commenting in this thread probably caught it the first time, but in case they didn't, since people are discussing filibusters there was a thread back in February from which I learned one very important thing about the current filibuster system:
That dynamic shouldn't be ignored - for one thing, it explains why, without changing the rules, we won't see fulfillment of Brett's desire that filibusters be required to "be carried out in person, for real".Posted by: Warren Terra | April 06, 2009 at 09:54 AM
hilzoy - D'ya really think that Orrin Hatch is a swing vote Republican?
Posted by: Stefan | April 06, 2009 at 10:13 AM
i remember reading about this at the time. the problem is that forcing a filibuster is just as demanding on the majority - more so actually. they all have to be around for quorum calls, etc. And these aren't spring chickens we're talking about.
I mean, that's what needs to be reformed too. Again, i'm reluctant to gut the whole thing. I'd rather make it harder or wait and get rid of it next term.
But i think the franken denial is actually even more outrageous. who the hell are they
Posted by: publius | April 06, 2009 at 10:15 AM
//Republicans: You Lost.//
Every vote is a new vote. Lose one, try to win the next. Forever.
Posted by: d'd'd'dave | April 06, 2009 at 10:40 AM
Stefan, I can't speak as to Hilzoy's reasons for including Orrin Hatch, but his hypocrisy on the issue of presidential nominations is really rather stunning.
When Hatch chaired the Judiciary Committee of the Republican-controlled Senate under Clinton, he blocked Clinton's judicial nominees essentially indiscriminately, leaving huge numbers of vacancies for Bush to fill.
When Senate Democrats in the minority under Bush threatened to filibuster specific nominees to whom they objected and when Senate Democrats in the majority under Bush were too slow for Hatch's preference in confirming Bush's judicial nominees but still far, far faster than Hatch had been in the same role, Hatch went in front of every camera he could find to denounce Democrats' obstruction as being responsible for everything from tooth decay to the regrettable quality of modern popular music.
The press, of course, somehow never thought to mention Hatch's own record when reporting his denunciations.
Posted by: Warren Terra | April 06, 2009 at 10:41 AM
Does the Senate actually have any authority to say whether the documents should be made public or not? I don't actually know the answer to this, and I'd be interested in knowing. My guess is that the answer is "no".
If they want war, bring the war. If they want to fillibuster, make them stand and talk until they pass out. If they block the nomination of one person, nominate somebody else twice as objectionable from their point of view.
If they want to make a 'principled stand' let them do so, and make them own every bit of it.
Then release the documents and tell them to eat it.
In fact, I'd say release the documents immediately and get that the hell out of the way. Then put the nominees up and let all of the Republican senators go on record as to why they oppose them.
Then hang "Senator X supports torture" on each and every one of them.
They talk big, let's see if they can walk the walk.
Posted by: russell | April 06, 2009 at 10:48 AM
Stefan: I was running down a list of Republicans who seem to me to have shown some shred of respect for what were once Senate norms. I don't think Hatch would be a swing vote in the sense of, say, possibly voting for the budget; it didn't seem to me to be beyond question that he would go along with this.
Posted by: hilzoy | April 06, 2009 at 10:58 AM
i think it's time to put it on the table.
yeah well, Harry Reid isn't going to do that. so, next option ?
Posted by: cleek | April 06, 2009 at 11:02 AM
The fact that Barack Obama is being blackmailed by Republicans who are seeking to cover up torture-crimes that he wants to be made public clearly demonstrates that he is exactly like George Bush, and intends to continue his interrogation policies.
Meet the New Boss!
That's not change we can believe in!
God, I'm so clever. Did you get that last one? About change?
Look at me; I'm a libertarian, and so incredibly principled when it comes to torture that I don't believe the fact the Barack Obama ordered the CIA and military to abandon torture needs to be considered when rendering a judgment about him.
I'm smart, and you're just a partisan.
/snark.
Hi, Hilzoy.
Posted by: joe from Lowell | April 06, 2009 at 11:07 AM
Russell +1.
They plan opposition to an appointment. Let them. Get the memos out. They stand to lose more.
Show some teeth. Or at least some spine.
Posted by: nous | April 06, 2009 at 11:12 AM
If we had real leadership in the House and Senate they'd simply ignore the threats and let the GOP filibuster.
First though they need to re-write the rules so that filibustering goes back to actually being a physical act. Piss buckets for everyone...
Posted by: Observer | April 06, 2009 at 11:18 AM
No filibusters in the House.
Nor confirmation powers, either.
Posted by: joe from Lowell | April 06, 2009 at 11:28 AM
"The Republicans do not seem to be willing to allow the President to do things that are plainly his prerogative."
And the Democrats howled when Bush did what was plainly in his prerogative, including firing U.S. attorneys.
We will show President Obama the same courtesy and deference the left showed President Bush.
And just because the left won this time doesn't mean the right should just sit back and give no opposition whatsoever to what they see as the socialism being forced on us by a President and Congress with absolutely no checks and balances. The media have been woefully lacking in any oversight of this administration, and the Democrats have almost filibuster-proof majorities in Congress, so where are the checks and balances?
Posted by: lilneelix | April 06, 2009 at 11:32 AM
the Democrats have almost filibuster-proof majorities in Congress
which is pretty much the same as having no majority at all, when it comes to getting legislation through the process.
Posted by: cleek | April 06, 2009 at 11:36 AM
lineelix, not that you care, but no-one was exercised about the unadorned fact that Bush fired US Attorneys. It was noticed that Bush had fired a whole swathe of US Attorneys, an unprecedented action for an incumbent President, and this led to further investigation that exposed partisan pressures within the Justice Department and strong evidence that US Attorneys were being retained or fired on the basis of their willingness to pervert the US Justice system in the service of partisan advantage.
It may also interest you to learn that no-one criticizes John Yoo simply because he wrote memos, but rather for what's in them; and no-one criticizes Scooter Libby simply because he spoke to journalists, but rather because of what he said to them.
But hey, you keep on fulminating about the "socialism" that you see "being forced on us", because that's what the Republicans blocking the appointment of legal advisors over the sin of opposing torture are all about.
Posted by: Warren Terra | April 06, 2009 at 11:51 AM
@lilneelix: Yeah, releasing legal memos that should never have been secret in the first place, under court order; that's socialism, all right.
The U.S. Attorney bit is rich. Lilneelnix knows perfectly well that mass firings for political reasons go well beyond the President's right to appoint USAs of his/her choice.
Unlike many past presidents, Obama has kept most of the previous administration's holdovers, including the m*f* in Utah who snuck the no-Senate-confirmation-needed-for-USAs bit into the reauthorization of the Patriot Act after both houses of Congress had finished with the bill.
And how has Mr. Tolman repaid this gesture of bipartisanship? By bringing charges against the young environmentalist who took part in the oil-lease auction to block lame duck Bush's parting sell-off to cronies.
Effing snakes.
Posted by: Nell | April 06, 2009 at 11:52 AM
We will show President Obama the same courtesy and deference the left showed President Bush.
OK with me.
And if Harry Reid can find the gonads god gave him, we'll kick your behind.
Nothing personal, it just needs to be done.
Posted by: russell | April 06, 2009 at 11:58 AM
publius: But if they keep blocking Franken
They can take it to whatever federal court they like, but Minnesota is going to award the certificate to Sen. Franken after the Minnesota Supreme Court rules on Coleman's appeal. My guess is he'll be sworn in by May Day.
If he's smart, he'll be in DC this week to cheer on Bemidji State in their first and fairy-tale appearance in the Frozen Four. (Sorry about the year your Gophers had, JMN.)
Posted by: Nell | April 06, 2009 at 11:59 AM
And the Democrats howled when Bush did what was plainly in his prerogative, including firing U.S. attorneys.
So plainly within his prerogative that the Attorney General of the United States apologized to Congress and resigned, along with many of his top aides, over carrying out that "prerogative."
Posted by: joe from Lowell | April 06, 2009 at 12:21 PM
The national media who cover these clowns -- with only a few exceptions -- are just as culpable. I'm a newspaper TV critic who's disgusted by most of cable news and what it chooses to cover -- or just as important, ignore. I don't expect this story to get heavy play -- just not "sexy" enough.
http://www.dcweasels.com/
Posted by: William A. Mann | April 06, 2009 at 12:37 PM
This is why I hate Harry Reid. He allows this bullshit.
Posted by: FHarry | April 06, 2009 at 12:38 PM
"i remember reading about this at the time. the problem is that forcing a filibuster is just as demanding on the majority - more so actually. they all have to be around for quorum calls, etc. And these aren't spring chickens we're talking about."
I'm not particularly sympathetic to this, at least not until they actively challenge the Republicans on it. Spend just 2 or 3 days making the Republicans look like idiots. Just two or three days. IF the youtube clips don't fly, and IF the Republicans don't end up looking stupid, THEN we can talk about how the system is just too broken to work. So far all I see is that the Democrats for some reason just don't want to push it.
That said, I hate these stupid confirmation battles, especially over advisors. For high level staff positions like this, look for dramatic disqualifying events (bribery, blatant incompetence, or clear corruption). Other than that, the confirmation should be routine.
Posted by: Sebastian | April 06, 2009 at 12:45 PM
I suspect this may be just variations of rehearsals for the Really Big Confirmation: next Supreme Court Justice. By proving what hell can be raised over relatively minor appointments, they may be trying to force a suggested Supreme appointee of a more conservative bent.
Posted by: Cyranetta | April 06, 2009 at 01:02 PM
I'm not particularly sympathetic to this, at least not until they actively challenge the Republicans on it. Spend just 2 or 3 days making the Republicans look like idiots. Just two or three days. IF the youtube clips don't fly, and IF the Republicans don't end up looking stupid, THEN we can talk about how the system is just too broken to work. So far all I see is that the Democrats for some reason just don't want to push it.
There are reasons Democratic politicians "just don't want to push it". They have to keep most of their members in the chamber for 48-72 hours in order to execute your experiment. The cost to Democrats of breaking a filibuster is actually much higher than the cost that the Republicans would have to pay to sustain a filibuster. The rules that allow members to halt legislation merely by threatening a filibuster do not change and certainly do not create this dynamic.
And even if they do, there's no reason to believe that Republicans will face serious political consequences: the demographic that enjoys passing youtube clips around tends to vote heavily Democratic already. Right? There are many clips of individual Republicans saying profoundly ridiculous or stupid things and those individual members have not suffered at all. There were plenty of clips of Palin for example sounding profoundly stupid and her base rallied in spite of (or maybe because of) those clips.
Even if clips of Republicans sounding stupid actually mattered, there's no reason at all for Republicans to humiliate themselves while filibustering. They could just read letters from their constituents (that for all we know were written by staffers) and no one in the media will touch them: media people are terrified of being accused of being out of touch with real Americans.
Posted by: Turbulence | April 06, 2009 at 01:17 PM
"There are reasons Democratic politicians "just don't want to push it". They have to keep most of their members in the chamber for 48-72 hours in order to execute your experiment. The cost to Democrats of breaking a filibuster is actually much higher than the cost that the Republicans would have to pay to sustain a filibuster."
Yes, it is much *higher*. But not actually very high.
Posted by: Sebastian | April 06, 2009 at 02:03 PM
media people are terrified of being accused of being out of touch with real Americans.
They should be terrified. Being out of touch with real Americans should be a firing offence in a mass media which claims to report on what ordinary people are concerned about, as justification for drawing their paychecks. The problem is that the Villager's definition of "real Americans" is profoundly dishonest and self-serving. A "real American" to the US news media is a fictional construct made up by Matt Drudge, for the purposes of creating faux sensationalism and supporting right wing partisan talking points.
There are plenty of real "real Americans" would like to see our Village pundits strung up from lamp posts for their smug dishonesty, laziness, arrogance and corruption. As it is, we'll have to settle for massive layoffs and closures in the newspaper industry and sagging ratings on TV.
Posted by: ThatLeftTurnInABQ | April 06, 2009 at 02:25 PM
"lilneelix knows perfectly well that mass firings for political reasons go well beyond the President's right to appoint USAs of his/her choice."
Actually, no. They serve at the pleasure of the President, and can be hired or fired at any time for any reason.
"Yeah, releasing legal memos that should never have been secret in the first place, under court order; that's socialism, all right."
No; expanding the federal government and burdening future generations with eight trillion dollars is socialism. Taking over businesses and firing their employees is socialism. Setting up socialized medicine is, obviously, socialism.
However...now that President Obama has set the precedent for firing an employee when the company received any federal funds, I'm sure when we get back in power we could use it against left-wing college professors, Acorn employees, ACLU employees, etc. I'm sure we could use the "tax at 90% on a whim" process, too! I'm looking at you, George Soros!
Posted by: lilneelix | April 06, 2009 at 07:39 PM
Another point about filibuster in person -- that person gets center stage. We've all seen Mr. Smith Goes To Washington, we know how effective a bit of theater it can be. The media has seen it too, they know where to point the cameras.
So the GOP gets someone reasonably charismatic to be the star, provides him with some expensive movies to show and yammer about, and suddenly you have the coverage equivalent of the GOP primary, for as long as he can keep it up.
The real question(s) is/are:
1) Why couldn't the Dems use that threat in the last 8 years, and
2) Why can't they nuke the filibuster now?
The answer is, the Dems simply do not command the same kind of loyalty or money as the GOP. The Democratic Congress can't agree on a story line, they have no party loyalty to speak of, and they keep wincing away from saying or doing anything that might offend the money. As a result, they become the majority only briefly, when the Republicans have managed to mess up so badly that even the American public can't help noticing -- and even then, they can't govern. If they had presented a united front with Obama these last 3 months, there would be enough enthusiasm for their programs that they could nuke the filibuster. If they had done their job as an opposition party in the last 8 years, they could have used the filibuster this effectively too.
Onliest thing to be done about it is, keep pestering your Congresscritters. Keep pushing them past their comfort zone.
Posted by: The Crafty Trilobite | April 06, 2009 at 07:46 PM
"They serve at the pleasure of the President, and can be hired or fired at any time for any reason."
Well, that's really weird that the Bush Justice Department said otherwise.
The Bush Justice Department appointed a Special Prosecutor. What wacky liberals!Read the report of the Bush Department of Justice.
Attorney General Michael Mukasey, acting on a recommendation from the report, appointed U.S. prosecutor Nora Dannehy to determine whether a crime was committed in connection with the firings.
Attorney General Gonzalez resigned as a result of this report and these events.
You might want to look into all this, but probably not.
What has any of this got to do in the slightest with the topic of this post and thread, which is the torture memos?Posted by: Gary Farber | April 06, 2009 at 07:54 PM
And the coveted Ed Meese Tautology Award of the year goes to...
Setting up socialized medicine is, obviously, socialism.
The prize: one extra-tasty menu. It can be picked up on any map which is the same as the territory.
Posted by: The Crafty Trilobite | April 06, 2009 at 08:25 PM
So the GOP gets someone reasonably charismatic to be the star
Mitch McConnell!
Wait, no....
John Kyl!
Hm. Maybe that's not such a...
Wait! Wait! Jeff Sessions!
Sam Brownback?
Aw, crap.
Posted by: david kilmer | April 06, 2009 at 09:00 PM
I'm with David Kilmer here. Exactly who does the GOP have in the Senate right now who is even remotely charismatic? We're talking about a group of people who are currently outpolled by herpes.
Posted by: Catsy | April 07, 2009 at 01:15 AM
We're talking about a group of people who are currently outpolled by herpes.
Oh, that explains the virulent objections to the vaccination...
Posted by: Jesurgislac | April 07, 2009 at 03:43 AM
I'm with David Kilmer here. Exactly who does the GOP have in the Senate right now who is even remotely charismatic?
They don't need someone who represents the platonic ideal of charisma; they need someone who will look good in the context of the filibuster. What is that context? It involves having the media fawn over you and present you as a legislative David boldly and foolishly attacking the Democratic Goliath. Americans root for underdogs. Even when they're horrible insane evil underdogs.
To put it another way, if the GOP has no charisma, they sure do win a lot of elections....John McCain did really well for a guy with zero charisma, didn't he? Or maybe context-free charisma isn't a very good metric for predicting political effectiveness.
Posted by: Turbulence | April 07, 2009 at 09:32 AM
All very theoretical, and all assuming that Democrats can't possibly respond in any useful way.
It hasn't been tried in decades. These same arguments were used by Republicans when they stupidly didn't break filibusters.
Take 3 days on some important issue and just do it.
*If* it turns out that you were right all along and the filibustering group somehow doesn't look stupid and obstructive, *then* complain about it. Right now it appears to me that just 2 or 3 days of medium-grade annoyance by the majority party could pretty much get this all over with. The relative burden is indeed greater on the majority party. But sticking around the Congressional building for 3 days isn't actually a very big absolute burden.
Posted by: Sebastian | April 07, 2009 at 11:33 AM
"Attorney General Gonzalez resigned as a result of this report and these events."
Well, reading the article you linked to in that sentence, I see that "they did not have enough evidence to justify recommending criminal charges in the affair."
and
“The inspector general after 18 months of investigation has basically concluded that the facts and circumstances regarding Judge Gonzales’s activity do not include any unlawful conduct.”
and
Mr. Iglesias had “failed miserably in his duty to prosecute voter fraud,” Mr. Weh said in the message. “To be perfectly candid, he was ‘missing in action’ during the last election, just as he was in the 2002 election cycle.”
I can see how the Democrats would be upset if they have a U.S. attorney who refuses to investigate their voter fraud, who is removed and replaced with someone who is not a Democratic lackey, but it still hasn't been shown to be illegal.
Is their a law you can point me to that says U.S. attorneys cannot be fired by the President? Or even one that says they cannot be fired solely for political reasons?
Posted by: lilneelix | April 07, 2009 at 12:06 PM
Lilneelix: Bush fired his own U.S. Attorney appointees because, even though they were hardened right-wing Republicans, they refused to prosecute non-existent cases of voter fraud. Yes, that's right, he'd accidentally found seven hardened right-wing Republicans who stood (at least sometimes) on reality-based principles.
He was justifiably sure, if they were fired and replaced, that it wouldn't happen again.
Posted by: voxpoptart | April 07, 2009 at 12:27 PM
Wow, voxpoptart, still no answer as to which specific law says he is unable to fire a U.S. attorney.
Posted by: lilneelix | April 07, 2009 at 01:13 PM
lilneelix: Wow, voxpoptart, still no answer as to which specific law says he is unable to fire a U.S. attorney.
There is no such law, but there is a smell test.
Posted by: Spartacvs | April 07, 2009 at 02:09 PM
lineelix,
Where do you see somebody making the claim that the firings themselves were illegal? Most of the criticism I've seen, both then and now, is that it was unethical and transparently politically motivated. It's fine for the administration to want USAs who support their policies and legal priorities, it's not fine to want them to play an active role in electoral politics. Firing them for partisan reasons was enough of a scandal, but then really upped the ante by lying about it (i.e., they claimed that they were fired for performance rather than political reasons). Any legal charges which were considered had to do with the lying, not the firing.
You do realize that they were all Bush appointees, right? Claiming that any of them were "Democratic lackeys" is a bit rich. (Although I give you points for not calling them "Democrat lackeys")
Posted by: Larv | April 07, 2009 at 02:11 PM
No; expanding the federal government and burdening future generations with eight trillion dollars is socialism.
So Bush was a socialist?
Taking over businesses and firing their employees is socialism.
1. So the FDIC are socialists? Which makes every POTUS since its inception a socialist - including Reagan!!!
2. Are the GOP politicians that want to bust union contracts socialists too? Why not?
Setting up socialized medicine is, obviously, socialism.
But Obama has never proposed setting up socialized medicine. He has discussed government provided health care insurance, but not government provided health care.
BIG difference.
Posted by: Eric Martin | April 07, 2009 at 03:07 PM
"Take 3 days on some important issue and just do it."
I'm with Sebastian on this. Despite Crafty's worries about the possible grandstanding, or the free 'Convention Speech', I think Democratic solidarity on an issue that Americans want taken care of could do wonders to turn the tables on obstructionism.
It'd could be a media freakshow, or a snoozefest. We don't know. But I think that assembling to make it happen could do wonders to educate a) the media, and b) average citizens about the rules a, ahem, mature democracy must abide by, as well as the stakes of the game that the Senate Republicans have been playing the last few years... Little Jimmy born with a catastrophic medical condition? This is what we have to deal with when we want to provide care for him. Rinse and repeat.
For Dem Senators in the halls doing interviews, be prepared, point out the excess of fillibuster use in recent years (in comparison to historical usage), and say we're done putting up with it. We got s#%% to do.
Posted by: laxel | April 07, 2009 at 09:14 PM
Of course, rereading my last comment, there is no guarantee that anything will happen. Maybe the filibuster will succeed, maybe reportage will be nonexistant, maybe Dems will cave, maybe a few Republicans will cross the aisle, maybe Dems will get blamed for tying up the Senate. Nobody knows. But calling the bluff primes the pump, sets the stage for introducing a meta-narrative that the Dems would be foolish to leave on the sidelines. Namely, unreasonable obstruction blows when it doesn't suck.
But I got no use for Reid, and don't ever expect him to force an old-style filibuster (unless it's threatened by Feingold), so this is just idle chatter.
Posted by: laxel | April 07, 2009 at 09:37 PM
If it doesn't work, *then* talk about changing the system. But not until you try to actually see if the system can work first.
Posted by: Sebastian | April 09, 2009 at 12:46 AM
As I have said repeatedly: First set the necessary majority for appointments for life at 2/3, then talk about eliminating the filibuster whole or in parts. Otherwise the courts will be filled sooner or later with Clones of Coulter(TM) and Kristianists(TM)
Posted by: Hartmut | April 11, 2009 at 05:25 AM