The solution is obvious. McConnell is *already* abusing the filibuster to block the constitution of the new majority. Nuking the filibuster is the appropriate response. At the very least the threat is the only thing that might make McConnell back down. politico.com/news/2021/01/2…
The alternative—cave to McConnell on this basic question of which party won the majority, and ratify his plan to set a 60-vote threshold for everything of consequence—would be a profound, irrevocable betrayal right off the bat.
This is an important thing for reporters to portray accurately, too. McConnell is *already* abusing the filibuster to nullify the Senate election results.
If Dems cave to this abuse it’ll be just appalling. But if McConnell doesn’t budge, he leaves them no choice but to go nuclear as a first order of business. The fact that he, again, created an untenable situation is the story.
There’s a big role here for liberal writers: to clarify just how vulgar McConnell’s latest hostage threat is (so it’s covered accurately) and how cripplingly destructive it’d be for Dems to cave (so they don’t). @ThePlumLineGS@jonathanchait@michelleinbklyn@joshtpm@ezraklein
In short, McConnell is telling Dems they can’t seat their newly elected members on committees, take gavels, etc unless they preemptively bless his right to filibuster everything. How is he able to do that? By abusing the filibuster rules! Rules Dems can change with 50 votes.
Let's be even clearer than this. McConnell is threatening to nullify Senate election results unless Dems concede him veto power over most of Biden's agenda. 'Filibustering the organizing resolution' is technical language to describe the weapon he's using.
But it's true, Democrats can neutralize McConnell's threat to their legitimate control over the Senate by doing the very thing he's trying to strongarm them into not doing: abolish the filibuster.
Excellent, people are starting to notice. McConnell is indeed nullifying the senate election through abuse of the filibuster rules and Dems are (inexplicably but hopefully only temporarily) allowing it, because some of them would rather be humiliated and robbed than use power.
I think what’s happened is that over time people have grown increasingly aware of the absurdities of the Senate, and the senators’ insistence on hiding behind them, so some bluffs are being called.
One reason I’m thrilled to see filibuster abolition go mainstream, and which I’ve been bleating about for 15 years, is that as constituted it inverts accountability. When a bill fails in “the Senate” it’s usually because of the minority, not the party in charge. LIKEWISE...
Absolutely pathetic. The Raskin proposal was one hour Zoom depositions and document subpoenas. That should be the baseline for negotiations and Coons should resign to let someone who isn’t a complete coward serve his constituents.
Get Romney in there, come up with some cap on the number of witnesses, divided between both sides, final call on witness relevance goes to the whole Senate, that’s the agreement. Just keep Chris Coons as far away from negotiations as possible.
What a horrendous failure this would be, and it’ll be entirely on Democrats. With the opposition cornered and in a blind panic, they will...call the whole thing off? Total betrayal.
If Trump were really hard at work in the White House trying to stop the insurrection and not, say, laughing his ass off in front of one of his many televisions, wouldn’t @JoeBiden now have total control over the exculpating proof?
Extremely fake curious that Trump’s lawyers aren’t asking President Biden to release all evidence in his control that shows Trump scrambling to restore peace and definitely not watching television and laughing and refusing to help.
THIS would actually be a good question for the WH daily briefing RE Biden’s arm’s-length approach to impeachment: is he in control of any evidence that bears on claims the managers or Trump’s counsel have made, and if so, doesn’t he have an obligation to come forward with it?
Taking bets now on which manager will say what thing that certain Republicans pretend made them so mad that they can’t possibly vote to convict anymore, a theatrical maneuver known to many as The Susan.
I wondered this as well! A good guess. But typically a senator will deploy The Susan only after a dilatory period during which he or she pretends to be open-minded about and impressed with the opposing party’s case.
A strategy optimized to get an insufficient number of moderates dug in on a worse bill, such that when it becomes clear Republicans are fucking around and there’s no way in hell there’ll be 60 votes for anything, there also won’t be 50 votes except maybe for the worse bill.
There’s no reason for this. Get the process moving quickly on the popular bill you want, make clear it’s the only ship sailing and it’ll pass with 50 votes. Maybe that entices some Republicans to throw in with the winning side. More likely it doesn’t, but if it doesn’t, so what?
Truly insane they’re going to do the same thing they did last trifecta, down to the same Lucy and same football.