Posted on 11/21/2013 9:40:37 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
President Obama delivered remarks today supporting Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid’s decision to deploy the “nuclear option” ending minority filibusters of some judicial nominees. The Democrats tried to limit the effect of their action, stating that it only applies to nominees below the Supreme Court level.
But the damage done will go far beyond judicial nominees. Bipartisanship in the Senate is dead. Harry Reid and Barack Obama had already done grave damage to it by passing Obamacare. Today they finished it off.
Democrats currently hold a 53 seat majority, plus 2 Independents who tend to side with the Democrats. A loss of just six seats will hand the Republicans the majority in the Senate. After today, that majority means far more and will be far more consequential.
In the 2014 midterm elections, Democrats will be defending more vulnerable seats than Republicans will be. Several Democrats currently holding seats in GOP states were already vulnerable. They include:
Mark Begich, Alaska
Mark Pryor, Arkansas
Mark Udall, Colorado
Open Seat, Iowa (Harkin retired)
Mary Landrieu, Louisiana
Open Seat, Michigan (Levin retired)
Mac Baucus, Montana
Jean Shaheen*, New Hampshire
Kay Hagan, North Carolina
Tim Johnson, South Dakota
Joe Manchin, West Virginia
That’s 11 races, 12 if you count Al Franken in Minnesota, who won his seat very narrowly in what may have been a stolen election. Minnesota has become a competitive state for Republicans in recent years.
The trends in Alaska, Arkansas, Lousiana, North Carolina, South Dakota and West Virginia have tended to favor Republicans in the Obama years. Manchin essentially ran as an anti-Obama Democrat to win his seat, only to turn around and support a controversial gun control measure that ultimately failed. Colorado has swung blue but this year Republicans knocked off a handful of Democratic state senators thanks to another gun control measure.
Reid and Obama are claiming victory today, but it’s a Pyrrhic victory. They will get 11 months to push their extreme judicial nominees into the courts without any input from Republicans. But this is more about politics than nominations. The move comes at a time when Obama needs some headline other than “Obamacare fails again.” He needed some way to fire up his base and give the media something else to talk about. He has accomplished that, for a day or two, and done away with rules that date back to the creation of the Senate along with it.
In 2014 Democrats will be running against a wave of public rejection of Obamacare, which has never been popular. A majority want it either overhauled or repealed. Thanks to today’s “nuclear” strike, Republicans can run all of the above races as “the 51st vote” to repeal Obamacare in the Senate. Landrieu is doubly vulnerable now, having voted for Obamacare and now having voted to support the nuclear option. Her likely opponent, Dr. Bill Cassidy, can run a two-pronged campaign against her as a tool of Obama, who is not popular in Louisiana, and a fool for Obamacare. She and Pryor, who voted against the nuclear option today, may be as good as gone. Udall, Begich and Hagan aren’t far behind them.
*I originally had NH as an open seat. My mistake.
This guy must have been born last Tuesday. That’s the only explanation I can think of for his lack of knowledge about how Senate Republicans will react to this.
There won’t be any blowback. ‘Bipartisanship’ will still mean that the Dems get most or all of what they want. That’s because the guys who are supposed to be on our side aren’t actually on our side. Anyone who doesn’t know this by now is either dumb as dishwater or not paying attention.
Couldn’t have happened to a nicer bunch of communist traitors.
Don’t worry, McCain is on the case ahahahahahahaahahahhaaha
Reid REALLY screwed himself and the DEMs over - NEXT time the GOP has the Senate and the WH - well, they say that payback is a bitch ...
What will they do then? Write a strongly worded letter? Complain about the media not being on their side? Cry about it in their tanning beds?
I’ll tell you exactly what they’ll do. Nothing. They’ll probably change the rule back and then cede MORE power to the Democrat minority in order to supposedly look like they’re being ‘fair’.
Wake up. It’s kabuki theater.
And you know all that will happen is Dems will whine ‘What about the rights of the minority’ and the Pubs will wipe their tears, pat them on the back and go “There, there.”
Since November 4th we have gotten call after call where I say “hello” then have to ask, “Who is this?” before the caller identifies themselves as “Republican National Committee”.
I reply “Not interested, thank you” & hang up. Screw ‘em.
Yep, the moment we swear in a conservative president, assuming we own the Senate and the house... We run our agenda flat out. No limits, no compromise. None. If the rats don’t like it, they can go pound sand, even over the smallest issue. We give them nothing.
I think I’ve got all their numbers blocked at this point, so they don’t bother me anymore. If I am going to give anything, it’ll be to the SCF OR Freedom works.
Anyone who doubts you need only look at the 2012 election's voter fraud. There was no call from the GOP leadership to investigate this fraud. No investigation, no protests, no nothing.
But I will tell you one thing the GOP leadership did do. They kept on collecting their paychecks.
If the Republicans get a majority in the house and Senate they will not vote to repeal Obamacare mark my words…
I think they’ve started sharpening the tines on their own fork today...
It’s not Manchin’s seat in WV. It’s the retiring Rockefeller’s
Yes, their bought off but for a handful.
Likely because doing so would be pointless. Obama will veto.
What they do have is a much better position to defund it, or at least parts of it. Without the senate, the president will be the lone defender of the Obamacastle, and we’ll put it under a damn good siege.
Yeah. That'll happen.
On the off chance that the democrat vote fraud machine doesn't work in the 2014 elections and the republicans take the senate, the democrats will just whine about the unfairness of it all.
The republicans will roll over and give them back the filibuster.
Look up "power sharing" that the republicans always agree to when proposed by the minority party dems, but the dems always reject when proposed by the minority party reublicans).
When all the powers are liberals, what makes you think we will ever see a GOP majority again?
They did this so they can absolutely pass anything and everything the senate votes on. GOP can’t do a damned thing to stop anything now.
What about those checks and balances now?
It’s called the second amendment.
I admire your optimism.
I think the Republican Party will continue to roll over, play dead and fritter away freedom for perks and privilege.
I see no way out of this mess that doesn’t involve enormous tragedy.
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