Obama: Filbuster Making Nation Ungovernable

[jefferson_dem]

Obama: Filbuster Making Nation Ungovernable
By Kenneth R. Bazinet

President Obama said today he is “very frustrated” by the repeated use of the filibuster to try to block almost every piece of legislation before the U.S. Senate, warning that the political maneuver is threatening America’s competitiveness.

“As somebody who served in the Senate, who values the traditions of the Senate, who thinks that institution has been the world’s greatest deliberative body, to see the filibuster rule, which imposes a 60-vote supermajority on legislation - to see that invoked on every single piece of legislation, during the course of this year, is unheard of,” Obama said in an interview with the PBS NewsHour.

“So I think that if this pattern continues, you’re going to see an inability on the part of America to deal with big problems in a very competitive world, and other countries are going to start running circles around us. We’re going to have to return to some sense that governance is more important than politics inside the Senate. We’re not there right now,” Obama said.

Obama noted that Republicans have drifted away from how even the father of the modern conservative movement, President Ronald Reagan, did business. Reagan cut many a deal with legendary liberal House Speaker Tip O’Neill, who managed to keep the Democrat-driven social safety net intact during the era of Reaganomics.

“I mean, if you look historically back in the ’50s, the ’60s, the ’70s, the ’80s - even when there was sharp political disagreements, when the Democrats were in control for example and Ronald Reagan was President - you didn’t see even routine items subject to the 60-vote rule,” Obama said.

http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dc/2009/12/obama-filbuster-making-nation.html#ixzz0aYV9cHMD

[Dennis Donovan]

1. I have a hard time getting behind the nuclear option, no matter WHO is in power...

Surely, a parliamentary mechanism can be put into place to negate such widespread abuse, such as we've seen the last 2 years...:shrug:

[ClassWarrior]

3. Allowing a single Senator to block legislation is NOT democratic.

NGU.

[bleever]

40. Especially

if he's some creepy blockhead.

:hi:


ed: NB: NGU!

[ShortnFiery]

12. Especially since we will most likely be under GOP rule come 2012. eom

[DrToast]

23. They just need to vote it out at the start of the next Congress

That's completely legitimate, nothing nuclear about it.

[iconocrastic]

29. He's got the greatest majority in decades and he complains about filibuster?

His problem is getting the 58 votes in his own platy plus 2.

Seems that we, the people in his own party are the problem, and hey, where's the public option he promised us?

Another straw man argument from the post-partisan president. He disappoints us and then tries to divert our attention by blaming the minority. What a joke.

If he delivered what he promised us he'd be in a lot better shape.

Amazing how he spins instead of telling us the truth. It's a sign of immaturity and desperation.

[backscatter712]

32. If it weren't for Lieberman's and Nelson's cockblocking, we'd have a public option.

We had a majority, with a few votes to spare, for a public option.

It's Lieberman and Nelson who decided to thwart democracy with their little stunts.

[iceman66]

36. Lieberman, Nelson and ALL 40 Republicans.

It is important to remember that.

[goclark]

44. Thank you for your insight nt

[niceypoo]

34. The GOP would use it in two seconds if the Democrats didnt fold on everything

Battered wife syndrome

[Blasphemer]

35. I was in favor of it even when the GOP was in power. I knew it wouldn't be long before Dems needed

it. I think that is why people like McCain were against it. I wish they had gone for it.

[BeyondGeography]

2. A very smart approach

[MercutioATC]

4. Repubs filibustered HCR? I must have missed it.

When IS the last time a filibuster made a difference??

[SemiCharmedQuark]

6. Are you not counting the procedural filibuster?

[MercutioATC]

13. We enabled that. We didn't have to.

Yes, it's a philosophical issue, but NOT an immediate one.

Dems own Congress AND the White House. WE write the bills and WE sign them into law. It's really almost that simple.


If this is really such an impediment, how did the Repubs manage to get so much legislation passed in the last 8 years?

[SemiCharmedQuark]

16. Because there are conservative Democrats, but no liberal Republicans.

[MercutioATC]

17. When IS the last time Repubs actually filibustered a Dem bill?

We may not have the cohesiveness we wish for, but is that really a reason to roll over every time we're threatened?

[iceman66]

38. They've fillibustered EVERY Democratic bill this session.

Did you even read the article?

Of course they don't have to actually fillibuster because Harry Reid lets them get by with a procedural fillibuster.

[HughMoran]

5. Agree Agree Agree

Something needs to be done to stop the trolls from having too much power even after getting shellacked in the last election.

[grantcart]

31. agreed

at the start of the country legislation could be blocked by states with 35% of the population - now it is 17%

[The Backlash Cometh]

7. Gee. Too bad we didn't have that weapon available when we were in the

minority.

[ClarkUSA]

8. The man knows his history, even if Republicans ignore it.

K&R

[Thrill]

9. Well use your bully pulpit to call them out. Stop being afraid to hurt their feelings

[ShortnFiery]

10. IMO, Obama better borrow Dean's balls lest he won't have the courage to force it. eom

[Indenturedebtor]

51. Well he'll have to call and ask his corporate overlords if he can go to the bathroom to reattach nt

[Vidar]

11. Telling the truth, for a change.

[glinda]

14. But that is the point isn't it? That is the Republican strategy. To make it impossible

until they can chip and chip and chip away until they gain power forever. By then it will be all over though with the environment, financial, poverty, homeless, sick, etc..... and if they do get back into power, well then... it is totally over with no chance of recovery. JMO.

[MadHound]

15. Easy solution, let the 'Pugs filibuster, take to the bully pulpit and beat them about the head

With their obstructionist ways.

Oh, wait, that would actually require Obama and the Dems to stand up and fight. Never mind.

[Blasphemer]

37. That has been my problem as well. Everyone is running from the mere threat of filibuster..

I say, let 'em do it. The American public would quickly become disgusted and they'd back down.

[depakid]

18. That's certainly true- but with healthcare, it could easily and lawfully have been avoided

All that was lacking was the political will and fortitude (or, as some credible observers are beginning to say- commitment to progressive reforms in the first place). It's entirely possible that the filibuster "threat" on healthcare was simply cover for the policies the administration wanted all along.

[vi5]

19. Then make them actually use it.....

..that's the issue. Make them stand there and talk. Let the whole world see them actually holding up the nation's business and prosperity over petty partisan bullshit.

Yes, I know it's Reid's job. But it doesn't help the whole perception of the fillibuster by claiming it's being used too much when in fact nobody is ever actually forced or made to use it the way it was intended.

[mopinko]

25. yup. if you aren't going to dump it, make them go back to reading the

phonebook. i remember one where harry reid was reading from a book he wrote about his hometown.
make them work it, instead of just saying that they would if they had to. fuck that.

[burning rain]

20. That they keep the 60-vote rule, shows they don't really want...

to get reasonably progressive legislation, because the 60-vote hurdle simply precludes that. Requiring 60 votes is inherently a conservative and anti-democratic position. 67 in former times--even moreso.

[harun]

39. 60 = Keep things the same. It is highlighting how corrupt the Senate is.

[burning rain]

41. Besides making it possible for robust change to pass in the Senate,...

ditching the 60-vote rule in favor of simple majority would decrease corrupt deal-making. There would be fewer scuzzy deals like Senator Nelson's Nebraska Medicaid scheme. It seems that the possibility of not holding the anachronistic fetish of 60 votes sacrosanct, has occurred even to some of the wizened codgers in the musty halls of the Senate, as this press release from Teapublican Senator Jim DeMint indicates.

What I would do, is change Senate rules to more-or-less match House rules, and steamroller those fucks in the GOP the way Nancy Pelosi does.

[harun]

47. I think they should. Even if it means someday Pukes get the majority

in the Senate and push through a bunch of nonsense, I'd still take it.

Primarily because I feel if they don't need 60, real change could occur and the Pukes wouldn't get anywhere near a majority ever again. Their policies are favored by maybe 15-25% of the population. They exert far too much power in relation to the number of supporters they actually have.

[burning rain]

49. I think you're right.

Certainly, the ability of 41 Senators to stop nearly anything, is a major source of citizens' apathy--people by a large majority vote for change, and can't have it--so why bother to vote? Paul Weyrich, at once one of the smarter and nastier extreme right-wingers has said he doesn't want more people to vote. And he knows what he's talking about.

[DrToast]

21. It's about time! Get on that shit! I wanna hear this in the news every day for the next year.

[blueworld]

22. We have a nation? No kidding? Like the olden days?

I thought we had two competing political parties subsidized by international mega-corps! Where you can always switch parties when you get your political panties in a bunch!

We really do have a diverse population of different races, ethnic groups, sexual preferences, religions, incomes, finances, jobs and immigration status? For creepers sakes, American is a gosh-danged melting pot where the issues transcend petty partisan egotistical politics?

It isn't like a red, white & blue Superbowl? "We the people" doesn't mean "only the people exactly like me"? Our Congress critters are REALLY supposed to look at the facts of each issue, consult their constituents and vote for the common welfare? The filibuster isn't supposed to be used every day for every petty political pissant who wants to strangle national progress until the next election????

Well, God Bless America, (except the part made in China)!

:sarcasm:

[LiberalFighter]

24. Obama really should had spent a few more years in the Senate...

Suggesting that what Reagan went through is the same as now is not true.

Now: Democrats control the Executive and Legislative

Then: Reagan a Republican was the executive, O'Neal a Democrat was the legislative on the House side.

Reagan had to negotiate with the opposing majority party while Obama trying to negotiate with the opposing minority party when he didn't need to. And at the same time the minority party (Republican) during Reagan couldn't very well filibuster.

[Cass]

30. Great point. The situations are not the same. nt

[tom_paine]

42. LOL - thats so funny and so true.

But then, lack of understanding of history is what Inverted Totalitarianism is about (in addition to docilizing the peasantry in a new way with Plausible Deniability built in, concentration of wealth, and all the rest iof the attributes it shares with Classical Totalitarianism)

[Odin2005]

26. I agree.

[white_wolf]

27. I dont know

Part of me thinks we would all be better off if they removed the filibuster completely or at least do as Thom Hartman suggested today and make a majority of the party doing it stand there and talk,

[rockymountaindem]

28. It sounds like momentum for having some kind of rule change in the Senate is picking up steam

Sounds good, because this stonewalling just to mess up Obama is out of control. I mean, at least Gingrich was forced to actually suspend government operations, which was done in full public view. That cost him hugely politically and he never tried again.

[iceman66]

33. Good.

He should start calling out the rethugs a lot more on their obstructionist bullshit.

[adamuu]

43. Now there's something. n/t

[tekisui]

45. Blow up the filibuster.

Thom Hartmann dedicated a good bit of his show to that very topic this week.

[Clear Blue Sky]

46. Fine get rid of it.

Then what happens when the Repubs control the Senate and the White House and nominate another Scalia to SCOTUS? Filibuster might come in handy there.

[Raineyb]

48. They could lower the threshold to 55.

Of course that's assuming they WANT to which at this point is a hell of an assumption.

[ibegurpard]

50. Republicans wanted to do this a few years ago

everyone thought it was a bad idea here.
Now it's just great...
you're changing the institution...be very careful with that.