Posted on 12/08/2008 6:35:27 PM PST by Clintonfatigued
Republicans are increasingly optimistic that Senate Democrats will shy away from deciding the fate of the still too close-to-call Minnesota Senate race, now that the prospect of a 60-seat, filibuster-resistant majority has been eliminated.
Speculation that the Senate might determine the contest between GOP Sen. Norm Coleman and Democrat Al Franken peaked after an attorney for Franken suggested in late November that the outcome could be decided by the Senate, and after Majority Leader Harry Reid for the first time publicly raised his concerns that some absentee ballots might not be included in the final count.
But that was before Tuesday's Georgia Senate runoff victory by Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss, a development that dramatically altered the Democratic risk-to-return ratio. While the Constitution allows the Senate to be the ultimate arbiter of who serves in the chamber, there is far less political incentive to intervene now that a filibuster-resistant majority is no longer at stake.
(Excerpt) Read more at twincities.com ...
One thing that I saw about Coleman’s first term in the Senate was his innate ability to say absolutely nothing of substance. Listening to Coleman was aural vanilla pablum.
His record was even worse. I’m not saying that he was a RINO. His record was not quite RINO-like. But truth be told, not many people can tell you one thing that he stood up for or accomplished in his first term.
Coleman loves to play the insiders game in the Senate. He’s not like Jim DeMint or Tom Coburn. And among many Minnesotans, that’s not a good thing.
Including about half of the Republicans in the Senate.
STOP the MADNESS!
This is typical horse manure from Politico. That site keeps getting worse. Who is this “Josh Kraushaar”, and what Daily Collegian did he write for last year?
How much of it is stupidity, I don’t know. What I do know that on the whole, the party has been struck with a severe lack of testicular fortitude. I’d love to see them call the Democrats to task rather than skurrying away like roaches when the lights are turned on.
I’m under the impression they can’t outright seat Franken.
IF MN certifies Coleman all they can do AFAIK is declare a vacancy by voting not to seat Coleman, Pawlenty would appoint Coleman to it and a special election would be held in Nov. 2009.
“the gloves will be off”
But the Republicans will do NOTHING about it. Oh, they will talk tough on Sean Hannity and make noise with Rush but they will go back and cower in the corner. Hell, they were coweriong in the corner when they were the majority. Scared to death that the press might learn of their name and take exception to what they might do. Even Bush, in the early conduct, with Rumsfeld, did the same thing. Don’t do anything that might pissoff the press corp. They might say bad things about us. God help us.
The Democrats got rid of two problems this cycle and they are not likely to bring them back. Watching Jefferson go down must have been sweet for plastic face and holder. Now a brother doesn’t have to be seen letting a brother off which is what would have happened, In Minnesota, dirty harry can dodge a moron by letting THE buck toothed moron go. For the rat it is a win win.
“dems have some in the Senate who aren’t dedicated marxists, and they want to get re-elected. So, maybe it’s a wash....”
Agreed. There may be enough “blue dog” democrats around yet that won’t be able to bring themselves completely over to the dark side for fear of voter retribution.
An interesting dynamic could be potentially happening here. It’s possible that the four levels of layering in congress, namely the extreme left, the moderate or blue dog dems, the RINOs and the true conservative Republicans will create a “quadri-partisan” congress that could result in one of two things....a good system of checks and balances, or a congress that will be totally gridlocked, depending on the numbers in the sub-groups.
In theory, anyway!
Militant
retribution = retaliation
Duh!
Militant
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