The Dreaded Filibuster

On Tuesday morning Democrats, anticipating Republican obstruction of President Clinton's nominees to the Supreme Court among other things, were in deep discussions over how to kill the Senate Filibuster. For some reason that is no longer a topic of discussion on that side of the aisle. However, the future of the filibuster has just as suddenly become something of a topic among Republicans.

Oh the irony.

CIA Admits it Spied on Congress

CIA employees improperly searched computers used by Senate investigators involved in a multiyear probe of the agency’s use of harsh interrogation measures on terrorism suspects, according to the findings of an internal agency inquiry that prompted CIA Director John Brennan to apologize to lawmakers this week.

Ten agency employees, including two lawyers and three computer specialists, surreptitiously searched Senate Intelligence Committee files and reviewed some committee staff members’ e-mails on computers that were supposed to be exclusively for congressional investigators, according to a summary of the CIA inspector general’s report released Thursday.

The document criticizes members of the computer team for a “lack of candor about their activities” when they were questioned by investigators working for CIA Inspector General David Buckley.

Read the rest here.

Democrats Quietly Cheer Tea Party Win in Mississippi

WASHINGTON — It is a major headache for the national Republican Party and perhaps the biggest break Democrats have been handed in this difficult election year: a three-week runoff campaign in Mississippi between a party elder, Senator Thad Cochran, and the sometimes unpredictable Tea Party favorite, Chris McDaniel.

Read the rest here.

Personally I think this is wishful thinking. Mississippi is among the reddest of states. In all likelihood historians will say that the election was settled by the GOP primary.

Feinstein Publicly Accuses C.I.A. of Spying on Congress

The chairwoman of the Senate intelligence committee on Tuesday accused the Central Intelligence Agency of improperly removing documents from computers that committee staff members had been using to complete a report on the agency’s detention program, saying the move was part of an effort to intimidate the committee.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California and the chairwoman of the committee, suggested on the Senate floor that the agency had violated federal law and said the C.I.A. had undermined Congress’s constitutional right to oversee the actions of the executive branch.

“I am not taking it lightly,” she said.

Read the rest here.

The NY Times flip flops on the filbuster... again

Back when Mr. Clinton was President the New York Times fumed about the threat of a filibuster to some of his appointments and argued on its editorial page for the abolition or at least severe curtailment of the weapon of last resort for a minority party. Later (coincidentally after Mr. Bush took office) they reflected and in yet another op-ed admitted that they had been wrong. The filibuster, they said, should be preserved to prevent a president from appointing judges who were "outside the mainstream" of American jurisprudence and political thought. Now they are again flipping. As of tonight the filibuster is undemocratic and being abused by the minority party to advance its political agenda.

And in the latter case they are to some degree right. Although I think it could have near term negative consequences, limiting the filibuster was the right thing to do, even if it is being done for all the wrong reasons. Both parties have abused it, especially over the last ten years or so. And yes, the minority GOP was way over the line in their attempt to unilaterally reduce the size of the most important Federal Appeals Court just to prevent the president from appointing judges.

Memo to the GOP: That's his constitutional right. Elections have consequences.

But Democrats take note... One day, maybe sooner than you'd like, you will be in the minority and a Republican will be in the White House. And on that day, you had best fasten their seat belts. Because what comes around goes around.

Senate Democrats Restrict Filibusters on Party-line Vote

The Democratic-controlled Senate on Thursday struck down the long-standing filibuster rules for most presidential nominations, voting mostly along party lines to alter nearly 225 years of precedent.

The rule change would allow federal judge nominees and executive-office appointments to be confirmed by a simple majority of senators, rather than the 60-vote super majority that has been required for more than two centuries. The change would not apply to Supreme Court nominations. It would dramatically alter the landscape for both Democratic and Republican presidents, especially if their own political party holds a majority of, but fewer than 60, Senate seats.

Read the rest here.

Reid Preparing to Move for Limits on Filibuster

WASHINGTON — Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader, is prepared to move forward with a vote that could severely limit the minority party’s ability to filibuster presidential nominees, possibly as early as this week, Democrats said Tuesday.

Exasperated with the refusal of Senate Republicans to confirm many of President Obama’s nominees, Mr. Reid has been speaking individually with members of his caucus to gauge whether there is enough support to change filibuster rules.

Given how much deference senators have traditionally shown to the rules and procedures of the institution — many of them in place since the 18th century — any modifications are a serious undertaking.

But among Democrats there is a strong consensus that Republicans have gone too far in their latest attempt to block White House appointments, by denying Mr. Obama any more judges for what is considered the most important appeals court in the country despite three vacancies.

On Monday, they denied him his third pick in less than a month to the court, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. If Mr. Reid determines he has the support, he could schedule a vote before Friday, an aide who has spoken with him directly said Tuesday.

Read the rest here.

Republicans Block Another Obama Nominee for Key Judgeship

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans on Monday denied President Obama his third nominee in recent weeks to the nation’s most powerful and prestigious appeals court and insisted they would not back down, inflaming a bitter debate over a president’s right to shape the judiciary.

By a vote of 53 to 38, the Senate failed to break a filibuster of a federal judge, Robert L. Wilkins, who was nominated to fill one of three vacancies on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, falling short of the 60 votes needed.

Unlike previous fights over judicial nominees, this one is not driven by ideology or divisive social issues like abortion. Republicans have raised few objections to any of the candidates’ qualifications or political leanings.

Rather, Republicans are trying to prevent Mr. Obama from filling any slots on the court, fearing that he will alter its conservative tilt.

Democrats accused Republicans of exercising a nakedly political double standard for confirming presidential nominees.

“Appointing judges to fill vacant judicial seats is not court-packing,” said Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic majority leader. “It’s a president’s right as well as his duty.”

Republicans have argued that the court does not have the caseload to merit filling the vacancies, and they have proposed legislation to shrink it by three seats. But that legislation has no chance of becoming law in a Democratic-controlled Senate, so instead Republicans have vowed to block any nominees for that court.

Read the rest here.

Senate Braces for Filibuster Showdown

The Senate inched closer to an eleventh-hour deal late Monday night in a bid to avert an unprecedented maneuver to change the chamber’s rules governing presidential appointees, with nearly all 100 senators spending more than three hours huddled in a rare bipartisan, closed-door caucus.

Rank-and-file senators came out of the meeting reporting progress on the confirmation prospects of President Obama’s selections to head low-profile but influential agencies. Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) echoed that sentiment but said no resolution had been reached, leaving in place a critical 10 a.m. Tuesday vote that would set up the historic clash over changing the Senate rules on a raw party-line vote so that Cabinet- and agency-level nominees could be confirmed without having to overcome a filibuster.

Read the rest here.

Obama Picks 3 for Top Appeals Court, Setting Up Battle

WASHINGTON — President Obama set a confrontation with Senate Republicans in motion on Tuesday morning by naming a slate of judges to a top appeals court and daring his rivals to block their confirmations. 

Read the rest here.

Harry Reid Preparing to Restrict the Filibuster

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is increasingly focused on the month of July as the time to exercise the so-called “nuclear option” and revisit filibuster reform, and he has privately told top advisers that he’s all but certain to take action if the Senate GOP blocks three upcoming key nominations, a senior Senate Democratic aide familiar with his thinking tells me.

Reid has privately consulted with President Obama on the need to revisit filibuster reform, and the President has told the Majority Leader that he will support the exercising of the nuclear option if Reid opts for it, the aide says, adding that senior Democrats expect the President to publicly push for it as well. “If Senator Reid decides to do something on nominations, the president has said he’ll be there to support him,” the aide says.

Read the rest here.

Senate Votes Down Background Checks For Guns

As the Senate began voting Wednesday on nine proposed changes to a gun control bill, the centerpiece proposal on background checks quickly failed to win enough support, despite broad public backing.

The vote on the so-called Manchin-Toomey amendment was 54 in favor, 46 against — failing to reach the 60-vote threshold needed to move ahead. Four Republicans supported it, and four Democrats voted no.

A controversial Democratic plan to ban dozens of military-style assault weapons was also defeated by a vote of 40 to 60.

The votes were a setback for President Obama, who angrily blasted Republicans for defeating the background check compromise, saying, “The gun lobby and its allies willfully lied about the bill.”

“All in all, this was a pretty shameful day for Washington,” Obama said, promising that “this effort is not over.”

Read the rest here.

Rand Paul gets his answer

About that filibuster...

"It has come to my attention that you have now asked an additional question: 'Does the President have the authority to use a weaponized drone to kill an American not engaged in combat on American soil.' The answer to that question is no." 

-Eric Holder Attorney General of the United States
From here.

Filibuster +12 hrs: High Drama in the Senate

It's past midnight here on the right coast and Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky) is continuing his historic filibuster. It has been over twelve hours since he seized control of the Senate floor and announced that he would not yield it until either his voice failed or the White House definitively answered the question which can be summed up as "Does the President believe he has the legal authority to assassinate American citizens on US soil without trial?"

The galleries are reported to be packed with spectators including many members of the House of Representatives who have come over to witness this rarest of congressional spectacles. For the first time I can remember, excepting votes or quorum calls, the floor of the Senate chamber is crowded with Senators from both parties, some of whom have been making lengthy remarks thinly disguised as questions in an effort to give Senator Paul a break from the long ordeal of continually standing and speaking.

True filibusters are exceedingly rare and one of this duration has not been seen in decades. And yes they actually have records of the longer ones and Senator Paul has a ways to go if he wants to break the records for any of the five longest filibusters...

5. Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis.): 4 a.m.
4. Sen. Robert La Follette (R-Wis.): 6:11 a.m.
3. Sen. Wayne Morse (I-Ore.): 10:14 a.m.
2. D’Amato: 11:18 a.m.
1. Sen. Strom Thurmond (D-S.C): 12:06 p.m

Stand with Rand!

Filibuster (8 hrs and still going)

As of this posting Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) is still filibustering the nominee for CIA Director over the administration's assertion that it has the right to assassinate American citizens on US soil without trial. Of course in the short term the filibuster is doomed to fail. But at least he is taking a stand and drawing attention to Obama's criminal policies.

Update: It looks like some left leaning news outlets are doing their best to bury this story. Just looked over at the NY Times and its not even mentioned on the front page of their website. Other sites while noting it have it way down in the list of stories.

Senator Rand Paul Launches Old Fashioned Filibuster Against CIA Nominee

“I will speak until I can no longer speak,” Paul said. “I will speak as long as it takes, until the alarm is sounded from coast to coast that our Constitution is important, that your rights to trial by jury are precious, that no American should be killed by a drone on American soil without first being charged with a crime, without first being found to be guilty by a court.”

Paul began his filibuster at 11:47 a.m. Eastern time. Around the one-hour mark, he acknowledged “I can’t talk forever” and said his throat was getting dry.

Read the rest here.

Good for him! Obama has refused to rule out assassinating American citizens on American soil.

Too big to fail and too big to jail

I never thought I'd hear myself cheering a liberal senator from Massachusetts. Strange days...

Banks are the enemy.

A Neo-Conservative Icon Leaves The Senate

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), a leading conservative voice in the Senate, will resign his seat in January to become the next president of the conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation, a sudden move with far-reaching implications.

“It’s been an honor to serve the people of South Carolina in the United States Senate for the past eight years, but now it’s time for me to pass the torch to someone else and take on a new role in the fight for America’s future,” DeMint said in a statement Thursday morning.

Read the rest here.

Senior Democrat in No Hurry to Avert "Fiscal Cliff"

As chair of her party’s Senate campaign arm, the architect of surprising Democratic gains and the incoming chair of the powerful Senate Budget Committee, Murray now occupies a place of special influence in the Senate.

And so what Murray has to say about the “fiscal cliff,” a combination of tax increases and spending cuts set to take effect in January, may be of particular importance. In a town consumed by talk of the apocalyptic consequences of failing to resolve the budgeting crisis, Murray has been arguing that missing the deadline for a deal — going over the cliff — could actually make getting a deal easier.

Read the rest here.

Personally I am not all that horrified by the fiscal cliff.  If we go over the cliff we will cut spending in both the welfare and warfare state and finally end the ill-conceived Bush tax cuts. The deficit would be cut in half at a stroke. I don't see any other proposals out there that even come close to a meaningful attack on the national debt.

Sure, if I was dictator for a day I would be a bit more discriminating in how I cut the budget deficit. But I have no confidence in the congressional clowns' capacity for anything other than finding some way to kick the can down the road again. Fasten your seat-belts folks. We need to go over the cliff.

The New Senator From Massachusetts

BOSTON — When Elizabeth Warren created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in Washington two years ago and sought to become its director, she was fiercely opposed by Republican senators who feared she had a visceral loathing of financial institutions and would be a thorn in their sides.

President Obama was so convinced she could not win Senate confirmation that he did not even bother to nominate her.

Now, Ms. Warren, 63, is returning to Washington as a member of the very club that sought to block her and dilute the power of her consumer bureau. She got there by campaigning against the big banks and lobbyists, the millionaires and billionaires who, she said, rigged the system against the middle class.

The question now is how she will approach her job as the newly elected Democratic senator from Massachusetts. How will she interact with those who spurned her? How can she most effectively fulfill the populist promise of her candidacy while serving in an institution that runs on seniority and prefers deference to defiance?

Read the rest here.