Posted on 05/22/2005 9:36:11 AM PDT by wagglebee
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist reportedly has the votes to enforce the so-called "nuclear option" against judicial filibusters instigated by Democrats, despite claims to the contrary by Minority Leader Harry Reid.
After a Thursday meeting with Senate Democrats, Reid boasted he was ready for the coming battle. "It was one of the most pleasant experiences of my entire life," he told reporters. "We walked out of there so united. We talked about what's going to happen after Tuesday," when the filibuster showdown is expected to come to head.
But according to New York Times columnist David Brooks, Reid was blowing smoke.
"Harry Reid, told a small group of us Friday he was cautiously optimistic that he had the votes to defeat the nuclear option, but I think he's wrong," Brooks said Sunday.
"John McCain, Lincoln Chafee, John Warner and maybe Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe will vote against the nuclear option, but none of the other Republicans are likely to."
"Bill Frist has the votes," he predicted.
Brooks also reports that attempts by Senate moderates to hammer out a deal to avoid the filibuster showdown have collapsed.
"The talks stalled. Joe Lieberman didn't bother to attend the final meeting. Positions will probably harden over the weekend, making a deal less likely tomorrow," he said.
When the New York Slimes says the 'Rats have lost, they've lost!
to expand on your comment...
They didn't lose, they have been routed and totally....
this vote, if its true, will end McCain's presidential bid.
Good time to get your "Nuke the 'rats T-shirt.
Since the early spring of 2000, the only group who ever really believed that McPain had a shot at even being the GOP nominee was the media.
Leni
Filibuster is wrong, any way you look at it.......it usurps the will of the voters as expressed by the elections that placed the Senators in office in proportion shown by the number of "majority" and "minority" parties.....filibuster is a perversion of Roberts Rules of Order that is absolutely contrary to the concept of "representative government", for good or bad.
Looks like frat boy has grown a pair. Good for him.
We can be grateful for that. Can you imagine that man in charge of our real nuclear options ?
Such as they are. McCain said this morning that he is not worried because he has plenty of conservative support. This is his brain on drugs.
You're right. He is the darling of the MSM, but only because he's almost as anti-Bush as they are. Their adoration has milstakenly given him the idea that actual people give damn what he thinks. And that has allowed him to make a total idiot out of himself.
Actually, it would be more like 1980, in which a "moderate" Republican, John Anderson, ran as an independent. It still did not stop Ronald Reagan from winning the presidential election, even though there was a defector from his party in the mix.
I think McCain would be in about the same territory. He would take more votes from a Democratic candidate, especially a Howard Dean/John Kerry leftist type, than he would from the Republican candidate. There are a lot more "moderate" Democrats than there are "moderate" Republicans.
I don't think I've ever heard it put better than that.
the POW issue will be McCains undoing......for his activities as a POW as well as his activities with kerry when they obfuxcated common sense and known facts to bring the issue to a dishonorable end in 1992.....
With approximately the same results.
But, wouldn't he, unlike Perot, siphon votes from the Dems, rather than the pubbies?
I love the smell of Napalm in the morning...
But he's likely to siphon off more democrats then pubbies.
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