GOP Filibuster Hypocrisy Alert

You gotta love the outright brazenness of the Republican party these days. It was bad enough when they were in power, but now as an increasingly irrelevant minority their demands know no bounds. Their latest temper tantrum is over judicial nominees and they want Barack Obama to know about it. According to a letter signed by all 41 in the GOP caucus, they have committed to using the filibuster if they do not get to "consult" the President about who gets nominated for such positions as Supreme Court justice. Of course, just a few years ago they were threatening to do away with the filibuster altogether.

From The Washington Times:

It also required that some senators go back on their previous positions, but Republicans said it’s more important that Democrats, not Republicans, be consistent.

“We’re not asking Leahy to follow the Hatch position; we’re asking Leahy to follow the Leahy rule,” said a senior Republican Senate official involved with judicial nominations. “Senator Hatch isn’t chairman now, and he wasn’t chairman for the last couple Congresses.”

Clearly, the "P" in GOP does not stand for "principles." I can't wait for next year and their caucus loses another few members. Then they can threaten to filibuster all they want, it won't amount to a hill of beans. Then again, they'll probably complain and demand the Majority Leader lower the filibuster bar to thirty-five or thirty senators.

Republicans Ready The Filibuster To Stop The Auto Bailout

Bring on the obstructionism GOP, there will be more hell to pay in 2010....and then the minority won't even come close to being able to filibuster in the 112th Congress.

Feingold And Dodd Vow To FISAbuster

Nothing was more deplorable (this month) for the Democrats than to let FISA go through the House with retroactive immunity. Pelosi, Hoyer and dozens of others forgot about their duty to their constituents and the Constitution and gave a free pass to the telecommunication companies that violated the law and let George Bush off the hook for masterminding these crimes against America. Moreover, the bill obliterates the Fourth Amendment and gives the government unprecedented power to legally spy on citizens of a supposedly free country.

Now the bill goes to the Senate and our chances aren't that great. Barack Obama did the politically centrist thing and endorsed the House bill, so counting on him to put an end to this isn't likely. However, there are at least two good men in the chamber that do care, and they are ready to filibuster this thing straight into the next Congress and hopefully make it gone for good.

From RawStory:

In a last-ditch attempt to fix a surveillance bill critics say would essentially legalize President Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program, Sens. Russ Feingold (D-WI) and Chris Dodd (D-CT) have promised to filibuster the bill as long as it offers telecommunications companies retroactive immunity.

“This is a deeply flawed bill, which does nothing more than offer retroactive immunity by another name. We strongly urge our colleagues to reject this so-called ‘compromise’ legislation and oppose any efforts to consider this bill in its current form. We will oppose efforts to end debate on this bill as long as it provides retroactive immunity for the telecommunications companies that may have participated in the President’s warrantless wiretapping program, and as long as it fails to protect the privacy of law-abiding Americans,” the senators said in a joint statement Tuesday.

“If the Senate does proceed to this legislation, our immediate response will be to offer an amendment that strips the retroactive immunity provision out of the bill. We hope our colleagues will join us in supporting Americans’ civil liberties by opposing retroactive immunity and rejecting this so-called ‘compromise’ legislation.”

Filibustering this bill shouldn't be too hard as long as the members remain committed. There isn't much time before the July 4th recess and once the Senate gets back there is a lot of bills to get in order. If this has the possibility of tying up the Senate for weeks, Reid might just put the bill off for good, at least for the 110th Congress. They key is to push the bill off this year and then do it right once Obama is President next year.

A Thank You From Chris Dodd

Chris sends a personal thank you out to everyone that cares about holding the tele-communications companies accountable for wiretapping Americans' phone calls:

If The Cards Are Right, We Can Take Back The Senate

Democrats have a slim majority in the Senate right now, but unfortunately the mere threat of a filibuster sends Harry Reid and his merry Democratic men and women scurrying for the trees. It is sad to see the takeover of the Senate last year do so little for the electorate that gave the Dems the upper hand.

There is hope for us however next year. If everything goes the way we want it to, Democrats could end up with sixty seats in the Senate. That would eliminate any chance for Republicans to strike fear into the hearts of our Democratic caucus.

So how do we go from fifty-one to sixty? Blow by blow it is rather quite simple. With all of the individual accounts of corruption and the overall Republican culture that fosters all of their evil-doers, many of the twenty-two Senate Republicans are vulnerable. Five seats (Hagel, Warner, Craig, Domenici and Allard) are being vacated for various reasons. Other incumbents such as Ted Stevens up in Alaska and John Sununu in New Hampshire are vulnerable to Democratic opposition.

Overall, Republicans continue to disappoint Americans and they in turn will show their displeasure come election day next year. The conservatives didn't get the message last year when they lost control of the legislature but I fear they won't get it next year either. Being stuck with narrow-minded vision has its downsides, thats for sure.

Diane Sawyer Apologizes For Unfair Treatment Towards Harry Reid

It is a rare moment in the mainstream media for a journalist to apologize for their errors, but Diane Sawyer admitted her mistake today for incorrectly saying that Harry Reid was filibustering. Apparently she forgot what the term means, even after all of her years covering Washington. Thankfully she remembered later on and fessed up to her mistake.

From Media Matters:

On the July 19 edition of ABC's Good Morning America, co-host Diane Sawyer apologized for her false assertion -- documented by Media Matters for America -- regarding Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's (D-NV) plan to hold an all-night Senate debate prior to the July 18 cloture vote on a Democratic proposal to withdraw troops from Iraq.

On the July 17 edition of the program, Sawyer said that Reid "vows to filibuster, talking all night to close out all topics besides a vote on Iraqi troop withdrawals." In fact, by extending the Senate session throughout the night, Reid did not "vow to filibuster," as Sawyer reported; rather, he highlighted the Republicans' blocking of an up-or-down vote on the proposal. Indeed, it was the Republicans who opposed the Democrats' effort to end debate on the legislation and move to a simple majority vote. In her on-air statement, Sawyer clarified that Reid had actually "held the all-night debate to protest the threat of a filibuster from the Republicans. ... You wrote me. You were right. I was wrong. I apologize."

Congratulations Diane, I hope your example of honesty will be mirrored by all of your colleagues. Of course, that is probably just wishful thinking on my part. Too bad the trend in traditional media outlets is to screw up and move on.