Well, this is going to be rich...Obama’s going to order Harry Reid around on which Senate rules to follow and which ones to chuck. And I seem to remember that Reid and his Rats screamed bloody murder when Republicans wanted to use simple majority votes back in the day.
Not exactly. Reid will be "in" on the deal in any event. There are certain legislative subject matters that have a statutory time limit for debate, so the usual Senate protocol of "unlimited" debate is inapplicable. Somewhere I have a list of those items ... I do recall it is in the Gold/Gupta piece that described Senate procedure, filibuster and cloture, in the context of stalled voting on judicial nominees.
Oops. Not the Gold/Gupta article. Memory, it's the second thing to go. I forget what the first is.
There are a few matters where the Senate is forbidden to engage in the use of a minority to avoid taking the vote. Budget is one of them.
... there are at least 26 laws on the books today abrogating the filibuster. For example:
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/rushton200504211218.asp <- Rushton
- You cannot filibuster a federal budget resolution (Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974).
- You cannot filibuster a resolution authorizing the use of force (War Powers Resolution).
- You cannot filibuster international trade agreements (Bipartisan Trade Promotion Authority Act of 2002).
- And as the minority leader, Sen. Harry Reid (D., Nev.), well knows, you cannot filibuster legislation under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982.