http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/01/23/reid/index.htmlHarry Reid -- who has (a) done more than any other individual to ensure that Bush's demands for telecom immunity and warrantless eavesdropping powers will be met in full and (b) allowed the Republicans all year to block virtually every bill without having to bother to actually filibuster -- went to the Senate floor yesterday and, with the scripted assistance of Mitch McConnell and Pat Leahy, warned Chris Dodd, Russ Feingold and others that they would be selfishly wreaking havoc on the schedules of their fellow Senators (making them work over the weekend, ruining their planned "retreat," and even preventing them from going to Davos!) if they bothered everyone with their annoying, pointless little filibuster.
To do so, Reid announced that, unlike for the multiple filibusters from Republican colleagues, he would actually force Dodd and company to engage in a real filibuster. This is what Reid said:
If people think they are going to talk this to death, we are going to be in here all night. This is not something we are going to have a silent filibuster on. If someone wants to filibuster this bill, they are going to do it in the openness of the Senate.That is what Democrats have been urging Reid to do to the filibustering Republicans all year -- in order to dramatize their obstructionism -- but he has refused to make them actually filibuster anything, generously agreeing instead that every bill requires 60 votes. Instead, he reserves such punishment only for the members of his own caucus trying to take a stand for the rule of law and the Constitution, those who are trying finally to bring some accountability to this administration.
<snip>
Dodd is ruining your weekend, preventing your fun retreat, not letting you go to Davos -- all because he wants to grandstand with "talking this to death." The President said he wants this done and we must give him what he wants and now, and I am acting with my good friend Mitch McConnell -- who is explicitly hoping to bully the House into passing the same bill in one day that the Senate passes, just like happened back in August -- to make sure this all happens with as little disruption and debate as possible.
If and when telecom immunity is passed (thereby forever extinguishing any hope of investigating and obtaining accountability for the President's illegal spying programs), and the Bush administration (and subsequent presidents) are vested permanently with vast new warrantless eavesdropping powers to spy on Americans, it will be because Harry Reid and the Democratic leadership conspired to ensure that it happened. They aren't just standing by meekly, failing to oppose it. They are actively enabling it with as aggressive a posture as the Republicans could possibly have employed had they still been in control of the Congress.
The whole thing is very much worth a read.
That 'D' after Reid's name fooled me for a long time, but no more. He's one of them.
As for Chris Dodd: he was floated as a possible Majority Leader before Reid, but passed on it. What a shame. No doubt he never dreamed how bad Harry would be. None of us did. Who could imagine such a piss-poor excuse for leadership? He's cozier with the damned republicans than he is with his own party. I'm just riled about Harry.
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