Go nuclear

JWR ^ | 5-13-05 | Rich Lowry

[FlyLow]

The routine filibuster of judicial nominees is being portrayed by its defenders as one of the most hallowed traditions of American governance, up there with Robert's Rules of Order, congressional committee hearings and Rose Garden bill-signing ceremonies. But this tradition dates from only 2003, when Democrats found themselves in the minority in the Senate and desperate to block Bush judicial nominees.

The judicial filibuster isn't a tradition, but an innovation; not a function of checks and balances, but a perversion of them; not an outgrowth of the Constitution, but at best irrelevant to it.

The Senate has two broad traditions. It has respected the filibuster, which allows a minority of 41 senators to extend debate indefinitely and block a vote on a bill. But it has also brought — in its "advice and consent" role under the Constitution — a president's nominees to the floor for an up-or-down vote without filibusters. The Democrats' new tack of filibustering judicial nominees has created a clash of traditions: Either the traditional respect for the filibuster or advice and consent as traditionally practiced must give way.

Throughout the history of the Senate filibuster, it has usually applied to legislative business. The theory is that if the Senate wants to make its internal business more difficult by requiring 60 votes, so be it. But the president's nominations are a different matter. They involve another branch of government. With limited exceptions, senators have avoided filibustering them because it was thought that the Senate's advice-and-consent function compels it simply to approve or disapprove a nominee.

[el_texicano]

I am tired of this nuclear issue coming up. I have ranted for these neutered Pubbies to "just do it" for months and months. And still they do nothing. I dispair that they will ever do anything. They have NO CAJONES!!! Simply put.

[devnull]

Why do I get the feeling that 'they' don't give a whale sh*t what we common folk think.