QOTD — Will Harry Reid Invoke the Nuclear Option?
On Thursday, Harry Reid is expected to ask his caucus to weigh in about invoking the nuclear option to change the Senate rules to stop the ability of the Republicans to filibuster President Obama’s executive and judicial appointments. This is after Reid agreed to a very weak fix to the filibuster rules with McConnell back in January, a weak fix that McConnell proceeded to regularly violate:
U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, frustrated by a dysfunctional and unpopular Congress that has been unable to perform basic tasks such as agreeing on a federal budget, may soon seek an unprecedented rules change in the Senate.
The Nevada Democrat’s aim would be to strip Republicans of their ability to stop President Barack Obama’s judicial and executive branch nominees with procedural roadblocks known as filibusters, which also have been used to halt much of the president’s legislative agenda.
This would ONLY be for personnel nominations, the filibuster would stay for legislation. John McCain is quoted in this article as being very worried about this change, while being completely complicit in the filibusters that have kept the Senate as dysfunctional as it is. Mitch McConnell is on record elsewhere as feeling very victimized by this action and threatening to change the filibuster rules for everything if the GOP ever gets control of the Senate. Which seems fine to me. The Dems aren’t especially good at the obstruction part and quickly cave in when editorial pages start calling them to task over it.
But we went through this in January, when for a few days it looked like real structural changes would happen. Instead, Harry Reid expected to be able to abide by a handshake deal with McConnell. A thing many people noted at the time was incredibly stupid.
So what do you think? If the GOP filibuster the next couple of nominations (and that looks like it could be Gina McCarthy for the EPA, Thomas Perez for Secretary of the Labor Department and Richard Cordray as Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, plus 3 possible spots on the NLRB), will Harry Reid invoke the nuclear option and change the filibuster rules?
Harry Reid takes his cues from POTUS so its unlikely we’ll see any changes in the Filibuster. Which is a shame because the Senate has the power to make appointments without the advise and consent of the House.
The right wing assumed control of the courts largely due to the complicity of the Carpers and Liebermans of this world. Those assholes wouldn’t support a legit filibuster, and we now see what hath been wrought.
We now have court-sanctioned state voter intimidation and the Kochs’ of this world controlling the flow of political cash as a result while scores of judges’ nominations languish.
The rationale for keeping things as they are is pathetic–THEY’LL do it to US if WE do it to them. Earth to D’s: They’re gonna do that anyway, or have the last 4 1/2 years of deliberate government sabotage by the congressional R’s taught you nothing?
Having said that, I think that Reid caves once again.
Pathetic and predictable.
Agreed. The nuclear option, if used, will be so watered down and diffused that it will seem like the vinegar and baking soda option.
Pathetic and predictable.
Y’know, just once, I’d love to see the D’s do something to fire up THEIR base, or, I mean, the PARTY base, aka the grassroots, as opposed to the corporate base.
Kicking sand in the face of these bullies sure would do the trick for me. Because it would at least show some willingness to fight back on behalf of something good.
Where’s Charles Atlas when we need him? Dead, if you must know.
The current watered down compromise is why we’re here in the first place. Any more watering down and they’re just waterlogged and still not able to get any work done. What’s odd about the Dems who keep clinging to this dysfunction is that they are clinging to a very old idea — filibuster as a way to make sure the minority is part of any compromise. Which is fine if the minority has an investment in something other than just insisting that everything has to be their way or the highway. You can’t hold on to an honorable way of doing business when your partner is never going to be honorable.
I would like to see a return to the talking filibuster. That would require work and transparency by the obstructionists.
He is so totally super serious about it this time, guys. There is absolutely no way he’ll back down at the last second….. again.
The NYT today reports that Reid will recommend changing the filibuster rules for executive branch appointees (judicial ones not included). McConnell seemed ready to relent on the EPA and Labor nominations, but it seems that the Dems are saying that isn’t enough. I still think they could get rid of the whole filibuster process — or at least make them work for it, Wendy Davis-style.
TPM says that Harry Reid took to the Senate floor to note that McConnell did not hold up his end of the January agreement, so the nuclear option is on the table.