Posted on 12/01/2004 6:40:51 PM PST by kattracks
The other day I was interviewed by a magazine which very closely follows what is happening in the Congress.
The reporter wanted to get my views on whether the President would nominate the same kind of judges he did during his first term. I said that I believe that the President firmly believes in the sort of judges he has put forth and I saw no reason why he would change in his second term.The reporter, with whom I speak frequently, told me he had just interviewed Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Minority Leader for the 109th Congress, and other Democratic leaders as well. He said they indicated that they were prepared to filibuster the President’s judicial nominees just as they did in the last Congress.
I said that would make no sense. They lost four seats in the 2004 elections. It is known that there was some grumbling in the Democratic Caucus at having to filibuster all those judges in the 108th Congress.
The then-Minority Leader, Senator Tom Daschle of South Dakota, assured his colleagues that filibustering nominees was a winning strategy that would help the Democrats take back the Senate, and that in the next Congress they would not have to filibuster nominees because the nominees would never see the light of day.
That strategy lost. There will be four fewer Democrats in the 109th Congress then there are for the 108th Congress. Moreover, Daschle himself was unseated, the first time since 1952 that a Senate Party Leader was toppled. I postulated that Senators on their way to vote would see the scalp of Daschle hanging up in the corridors of Congress. They would look at that and say, “I don’t want to be next.”
The reporter told me that Reid and his colleagues see things very differently. They think that the election of the new Senators in the South has nothing to do with judges. They think that Daschle’s defeat also had little to do with judges.
They apparently believe that they lost all five contested seats in the South because these are “Red” States (States which the President carried in this past election) and these new Senators were just carried along with President Bush.
As to Daschle, South Dakota has a history of tossing out its Senators after three terms, plus, according to these Democrats, there were many local issues which contributed to the Daschle defeat.
I guess we could call this “Democrats in denial.”
First of all, the issue of judges was very prominent in the Daschle-Thune race. Senator-elect John Thune raised the judges issue continually in his brilliantly orchestrated campaign. So did President Bush.
President Bush never gave a speech in this campaign without bringing up the Senate’s blocking his nominees. Reporters who covered the President tell me it was one of the best applause lines in his standard stump speech.
The other line which got thunderous applause was the President’s support of a Constitutional Amendment on marriage. That also was related to out-of-control judges.
The President promised to pick judges who would interpret the law, not try to write laws themselves. So even if it is true that the five new Southern Senators were the products of President Bush’s coattails, indirectly they got there because the President made judges an important campaign theme.
I reject the notion that these Senators only got elected because of President Bush. All five of them ran excellent campaigns and they themselves raised the judges issue. Each of them promised to vote to confirm the President’s judicial nominees.
If Democratic Senators want to go on believing that the filibuster of judges had nothing to do with the new Senators coming into office, they will be in for a rude surprise in 2006. I know that the Party in the White House is supposed to take a terrible beating in the Congress in the sixth year of an eight-year term. But if Democrats keep on obstructing, Republicans may reverse history as they did in the 2002 elections.
Many of the Democrats running for re-election in 2006 are running in the Red States. Ken Mehlman is going to do his best to keep the Republican organization alive and well in those States in particular. Indeed, if the Democrats continue to filibuster judges, that may turn out to be THE issue in 2006.
If the Democrats are indeed in denial, then where does that leave Majority Leader Bill Frist? Clearly he simply can’t tolerate cloture vote after cloture vote in the new Congress. Republicans will be in trouble in this next election if they are perceived as having accomplished little.
It is time for the “nuclear option”. There are two ways to accomplish getting the Senate to the place where it takes just 51 votes to confirm a judge or justice. The first would be to amend the Senate Rules at the beginning of the session. That is dangerous. While there is overwhelming sentiment to abolish the practice of requiring 60 votes to break a filibuster against confirming a judge, conservatives do not want to weaken Rule 22 as to legislation.
When I was hired by the late Senator Gordon Allott (R-CO) in 1966, there were just 33 Republican Senators. The only weapon we had to stop the Great Society juggernaut was the filibuster. Yes, things look good for Republicans now, but the day may come again when they are down to that many Senators. They don’t want to put themselves in the position where they can’t stop the initiatives of a Democrat President if need be.
Changing the rules might make it possible for the liberals to attack the legislative filibuster when they get back in power. We just can’t take that chance.
The other way to achieve the objective of having just 51 votes to confirm a judge or justice is to wait for the Democrats to begin to filibuster. A Senator then could make a point of order, contending that the requirement of 60 votes to confirm a judge is unconstitutional.
The Vice President (who should have been notified to preside at that point) would rule that 60 votes is indeed unconstitutional. Then virtually all Republican Senators would have to vote to uphold the ruling of the chair, which, of course, would be challenged by the Democrats. The Senate then would proceed on the nomination at hand and would have an up-or-down vote on the nominee in question.
That is the preferred option. It sets a precedent and the Senate operates on precedent.
The problem is that it does require at least 50 Republicans voting to uphold the ruling of the chair. That means the Majority Leader could lose five of his colleagues. That is one of the reasons that Senators pushed the incoming Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, who now has agreed to consider this move he had earlier opposed.
The reason Senator Frist didn’t move earlier on this option was concern that he could not get 50 Senators to uphold the chair. In the 108th Congress he could afford only two defections: one Republican and Sen. Zell Miller (D-GA).
Something must be done to break the logjam. Democrats had either filibustered or have said that they were going to filibuster up to 18 of the President’s nominees to the Courts of Appeals. These Courts are terribly important.
The Supreme Court only takes a handful of cases each term. Most issues are settled in the Courts of Appeals and far more in State courts of last resort. Moreover, many nominees for the Supreme Court have come from the Courts of Appeals.
Some observers believe that some of these Circuit Court nominees are being filibustered now because Senators don’t want to have to filibuster a nominee for the Supreme Court later.
What Majority Leader Frist does on judicial nominees in many ways will determine the outcome of the 109th Congress. If he finds a way to break the logjam without damaging the legislative filibuster he will be a hero to the conservative movement. If he fails to break the logjam it will mean we will be in for two years of constant frustration.
Let us hope Senator Frist prevails. Indeed, some believe he will leave the Senate after the 2006 elections to run for President. Wouldn’t he have one fine story to tell if he could showcase all of President Bush’s judiciary nominees confirmed and serving the Nation? One fine story indeed.
Paul M. Weyrich is Chairman and CEO of the Free Congress Foundation.
Unfortunately, I have to agree with your assessment of the situation since it is the pattern of Republicans in the past. I just hope they realize that they have milked this issue for all it's worth and it will not be to their advantage to try to use it again in '06 to get more Republicans elected to the senate. If they do not act like the majority party now and produce, they will certainly find themselves where they seem to be most comfortable - in the minority once again.
"I know, I know, until the Republicans get a 99 to 1 majority, they can't stop the Democrats."
Absolutely. That behaviour is so deeply imbedded that one wonders whether they really want or fear the change they continually talk about.
Actually, there's an easier way than that .. it's by changing the rules. It only needs majority to pass. Since the repubs have a majority .. the dems will be outfoxed. Once the rule is changed, each nominee will only need 51 votes to pass - not 60. At least I think that's how it works. Frist has talked about it and so have others from the Senate.
I agree. Paul Weyrich is usually on target and I usually like his commentary.
However, this fear of breaking the filibuster because it might come back to haunt the Republicans when the RATs are in power is wrong.
We MUST get our judges on the bench now. It is crazy to not do this out of fear of what may happen in ten years when the tables are reversed. We have the strength NOW. We need to act NOW.
To not act will keep the Senate in a go nowhere tug of war for another decade. At the end of Bush's term in Jan. 2009, we need to look back and say "this is what we accomplished" and that MUST include saying we put a large number of judges on the bench who (hopefully) are strict Constitutionalists.
Just imagine saying that "we allowed the Senate DemocRATs to obstruct most of our agenda" (including judicial nominees).
If we do, then we should toss the Republican Party in the dumpster for good.
>>They just lost because they were in Red States. << (paraphrased)
Nahhh... Reid can't be THAT stupid. Surely he knows that ceding red states gives Republicans a 62-Senator starting point. If the Demonrats want to filibuster a nominee, all I can say is: YIPPEE! The filibuster will be broken, and the Republicans will get 60 votes next election.
Another (very effective) way of doing it is to get rid of the dual-track method of doing business. That is, force the donks to filibuster and hold up all other business until the filibuster is over.
I don't suppose you have a list of Red state Dems up for election in 2006, by any chance?
That's the thinking of a chump. What leads these Republicans to believe that by restraining themselves now that liberals will act in kind later? If the liberals ever get back in power, they will try to change the rules in their favor whether the Republicans change them now or not. So, they might as well go for it.
Maybe it's kind of thinking that leads the Repubs to behave like bunch of cringing milquetoasts.
I think filibusters by Repubs on future Democrat Nominees would be just as bad as the current filibusters by the Dumbocrats.
The Senate does not have a right IMO not vote up or down on the presidents nominees. The people elected the president to appoint judges not the senate.
Akaka, Daniel
Allen, George
Bingaman, Jeff
Burns, Conrad
Byrd, Robert
Cantwell, Maria
Carper, Thomas
Chafee, Lincoln
Clinton, Hillary
Conrad, Kent
Corzine, Jon
Dayton, Mark
DeWine, Mike
Ensign, John
Feinstein, Dianne
Frist, Bill
Hatch, Orrin
Hutchison, Kay
Jeffords, James
Kennedy, Edward
Kohl, Herb
Kyl, Jon
Lieberman, Joseph
Lott, Trent
Lugar Richard
Nelson, Bill
Nelson, Ben
Santorum, Rick
Sarbanes, Paul
Snowe, Olympia
Stabenow, Debbie
Talent, James
Thomas, Craig
I had not heard of this 2nd option. Indeed, it is a much better alternative to the so called "nuclear" option.
I remember reading a quote from a Dem Senator who said exactly that - there is a procedure to stop them and if the GOP didnt like their behavior then maybe they should just change that rule.
I say it's about time we take him up on the offer.
The only states where judges will be an issue is Nebraska. Incumbent Ben Nelson v. likely challenger Gov. Mike Johanns. I would imagine Ben Nelson will vote consistently w/ Republicans to invoke cloture to avoid making judges an issue.
For what it's worth, other interesting races:
WV - Open seat? Will KKK Byrd retire? Or be committed?
NJ - Open seat? Corzine is running for Gov
MN - Mark Dayton has just recently made a fool of himself once again, whining about not getting invited on the field trip. MN has some potentially great candidates to challenge, hopefully Mark Kennedy.
WA - Potentially vulnerable Dem. incumbant. Plus, voters will get their first opportunity to react to the latest election fiasco the Dems are trying to pull off. Can't imagine that it won't turn more than a few off.
Well, now those elections are over, and Bush has scored a clear and non-controversial (except to some seriously deluded DUmmies) victory, they don't even have that canard to fall back on.
The following is supposedly an actual question given on a University of Washington chemistry mid-term. The answer by one student was so "profound" that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well.
Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?
Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.
One student, however, wrote the following:
First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving.
As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different Religions that exist in the world today. Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell.
With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.
This gives two possibilities:
1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.
2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over.
So which is it?
If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, "it will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you, and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number 2 must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over. The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct...leaving only Heaven thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting "Oh my God."
THIS STUDENT RECEIVED THE ONLY "A
I could not resist . . .
Thanks! i that.
Correction:
Post # 38 should have read as follows: Thanks! I enjoyed that.
What Weyrich doesn't realize is that the next time that the Dems get control of Congress, they are going to eliminate the filibuster, both as to legislation and as to judges. The days of letting a minority stop the majority are over, for both sides. They are more determined to get their way than we are.
So, keeping the filibuster for that day when Dems are back in power in the far distant future will not protect future Republican minorities. Better to eliminate the rule at the outset of the session, at least as to judicial nominees. As to legislation, I think there should be time limits to filibusters. It is not the right of the minority to obstruct. To force people to rethink for a while is ok.
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