With my eyes, I don’t very often read my comments anymore, and more seldom reply to them. Apparently, in my articles about the filibuster kerfuffle in the Senate, I get a consistent question in the comments asking me if I actually want to have Manchin and Sinema nuke the filibuster for voting rights, and in so doing, gift McConnell and the GOP with a simple majority the next time they take power. Fair question.
My answer? Yes, yes, 1000X yes! When you look at the last 8 years, not just historically but with the current words and actions of the participants, especially McConnell, you find that the filibuster gambit is just one more long con to help the GOP maintain control.
When then Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid nuked the filibuster for cabinet and administrative appointees, as well as non SCOTUS judicial appointments, Yertl threw a major Turtle fit. He grimly predicted the end of the world, and promised to finish what Reid had started as soon as he got the majority back. When McConnell got the majority back he did no such thing, simply nuking the filibuster for SCOTIS nominations as well. There was a perfectly logical reason for this.
McConnell and the GOP absolutely require the filibuster for their survival, where the Democrats no longer do. The reason is simple. When the Democrats have control, they do the worst thing in the world. They actually legislate! They propose and pass shit that will be popular with the American public, including GOP voters in many cases. McConnell must have the filibuster to stop the Democrats from making the GOP useless and obstructionist.
In 2016, the GOP held power in the House, the Senate, and the White House. This was the dead perfect time for McConnell to make good on his threat, nuke the filibuster for legislation, and start passing all kinds of insane shit that Democrats are currently wringing their hands and thumping their breasts about the GOP doing if the Democrats nuke the filibuster once and for all. And he didn’t fucking do it!
Trump’s only notable legislative accomplishment in 4 years was his corporate tax giveaway, which they accomplished through reconciliation, avoiding the filibuster! Why didn’t McConnell nuke the filibuster, and pass the tax giveaway that way to rub the Democrats noses in it? It’s exactly his style of vindictive dick move. But he didn’t, because he can’t. He needs that filibuster, and the Democrats don’t.
Because the GOP is no longer capable of legislating. They couldn’t legislate their way out of a paper bag. The House GOP has the Freedom Caucus, which is the House version of Mitch McConnell. Their sole purpose is to obstruct. And even if you bribe them, the Trump caucus of the House is so insane that anything they pass is almost guaranteed to be DOA in the Senate! They have no platform, no agenda, and no vision. Dear Lord, they couldn’t even get rid of the ACA on a simple majority vote!
That isn’t going to change anytime soon. Trump is still firmly in charge of the GOP, and is now making a fealty pledge a requirement in order to avoid a primary challenge. As long as the House GOP is saddled with the Freedom Caucus and the Trump Caucus, it is almost impossible for them to pass a bill that any Senate would seriously consider.
This is why the Democrats should and must nuke the filibuster. Today! If the Democrats do that, they can pass the hard and human infrastructure bills of their dreams, pass a more expansive version of the For The People Act, get the George Floyd Act, including eliminating police limited liability over the finish line, and get the John Lewis Voting Law done. That would make them a juggernaut heading into the 2022 midterms.
And if the GOP retakes the House? So what? They still can’t ask anything, and what they do won’t get through the Senate even if the GOP takes that back too. And Biden will just veto it anyway. And even in that worst case, what better 2024 comparison point than 2 years of abject GOP failure after 2 years of explosive success? The time is now.
Follow me on Twitter at @RealMurfster35
Absolutely excellent piece, Murf! And I agree with every word of it. They need it, we don’t. And your explanation of WHY is flawless.
Yes, and perfectly put too.
They don’t DO anything, they just block others from doing things. Our side DOES things, we don’t block things for the sake of it, just because we can.
They don’t stand FOR anything, all they are is AGAINST what we want, WHATEVER it is
The Republicans don’t do much, but they do give away tax cuts to the rich so their donors get their “investment” back, as a result the deficit get even larger and that leaves the Democrats with even more to fix once they regain power. Republicans tell everyone twice or trice they’re cutting taxes, but keep their mouth shut about the budget while they are in power, then when it’s the Democrats again, the Democrats responsibly tell everybody about the new taxes to fix the budget and then they wonder why Joe Blow votes Republican. He’s not a billionaire, in fact he doesn’t have 2 cents to his name, but he might find oil on his single acre or win the lottery.
“It’s about the principle, boy! That and the gas prices. Can’t tell me the gas prices stay the same each time the Democrats go looking for tax money. I can see they keep rising, can’t you? It’s plain as day, boy!”
I read this earlier and thought WOW. But before commenting I wanted to let it roll around in my mind some, and then take a “devil’s advocate” approach to thinking about it.
And I still think WOW.
If either of my Senators were Democrats I’d be calling and sending this to them. As a former resident of WV for over ten years (until seven years ago) I will still be in touch with Manchin’s office both in DC and the local one near me (in Martinsburg) when I lived up there.
I believe you have boiled this down to the essence. And it’s awfully powerful.
Thank you Dennis…That is rare praise indeed, and I take it humbly…I am well used to your “devil’s advocate” approach, and actually enjoy the opposing viewpoint as an intellectual exercise, keeps me on my toes…But I’m blown away that I was able to construct something so tight that you had trouble finding chinks in the armor…
Part of why I think you are on to something is your noting that for two years McConnell could have allowed all manner of stuff that big dollar Republicans and Trump himself would have loved. However even he knew there was only so much he could overtly do and keep the average folks out there suckered and continuing to vote against their own interests. He and the GOP still got a shitload of stuff done with gutting regulations, and of course packing the courts.
But the kicker is that tax cut. Supply side #3. Appalling as it was, and knowing damn well he’d have to resort to reconciliation I was surprised it wasn’t as big (despite what Trump has always claimed) as big as the first two. Even then he (and the folks it benefited) knew not to push things too far – that there was a limit to the bullshit they could sell to average income GOP voters and Independents. He and the folks that tax cut was for knew full well that after the first two go-rounds the budget and deficit exploded, and for all the talk good American jobs didn’t materialize. They knew the Trump tax cut wouldn’t create a bunch of new American jobs either.
So even then, with all that wind in the sails and the ability to do so much damage legislatively McConnell knew not to push it, knowing eventually (as it always does) the pendulum would swing back. The GOP got away with Democrats fixing some of the mess with the Clinton and Obama administrations but I think you’re right – McConnell had a genuine worry that they couldn’t keep pulling the same trick. Too many people in his and other GOP states would start to wonder just when all those “job creators” would start creating them HERE instead of continuing to move things overseas.
And, with so much of the wealth already transferred to the upper five percent (and the amount to the top one percent is obscene) there just wasn’t much more to squeeze out of average folks.
He was afraid of what no filibuster would do to the GOP in the long term because without it Democrats would be (as has been happening) pushing things that state and local GOP elected officials are clamoring for and therefore so are working class and GOP voters. Stuff that will provide jobs and benefit even small town/rural Americans. But at the federal level and even in some states with RWNJ Governors (Brownback in Kansas being a prime example) only want to provide things to help those who already have more than most of us can dream of.
As I thought about it, the Kansas experiment was probably a huge wake-up call for McConnell and the GOP. In that state “laboratory of Democracy” the whole supply side economic voodoo failed so spectacularly they elected a freaking Democrat! Not a progressive one, and barely what we’d call moderate but that, and getting a Congressional seat was unthinkable not that long ago.
In his own state, McConnell could see an ill wind blowing with Gov. Bevin. All those “real American” white folks (unlike most of what we think of as southern states Kentucky has a small as in less than ten percent number of black voters) LIKED their Obamacare. Because it was called something else – KYNECT if memory serves. It was Obamacare under a different name, approved by the Obama administration because it was exactly that. Bevin promised to get rid of it and Kentucky voters literally didn’t believe him. And they were fucking SHOCKED when he set about trying to do exactly that!
Bevin had other Brownback type nonsense in his head and McConnell saw trouble ahead for him and sure enough Kentucky elected a moderate Democrat in a close election. Bevin would have won in a walk except he did what the crazies in the House and Senate GOP caucuses would do.
So yes (again), I think it’s not only possible but likely that McConnell didn’t ditch the filibuster because he was afraid not only of what Democrats would do if back in power, but what REPUBLICANS would do.
And that’s why I have had a hard time finding fault with the case you made. It could be there are factors out there neither of us have thought of. Yet. Hey – we share the decades of grief of dashed hopes visited on us by our beloved Cubbies. Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is a fear I will never lose. And as important as the Cubs and baseball once were to me seeing it happen on shit that truly matters like what our political leaders do or don’t do admittedly makes me temper any hopes or confidence for the future no matter how likely something seems.
But tonight, I think there is finally a simple and straightforward case to make to our leaders in DC as to why it’s time to if not do away with the filibuster entirely then neuter it. For example by turning it back into the old-school Mr. Smith goes to Washington version. Few people can hold out by standing and talking for a couple of days, or even 24 straight hours. There are other things that could be done to effectively make it impossible to sustain a filibuster longer than a few days, or a week at most. But that’s a topic for a different time.
The main thing is I see a strong argument that we can all make that needs to become a widespread narrative starting NOW.
No matter what happens, in the long run, we the people, should stay on top of idiots like Gym Jordon that prance around committee meetings, blathering vile shit attacks on Dr. Fauci, who is really getting tired of know-nothings chewing on his intelligence …
Nuking the filibuster for the ordinary run of Senate business makes no difference to McTurtle when he has the majority, as you say. McTurtles object of desire is advancing GOP control of the courts and, for that mission, he already has what he needs by being able to ram nominees through as he has demonstrated.
Okay, good, you finally addressed the question. But I am not sure it is a satisfactory answer. McConnell did not need the filibuster when the GOP had the majority, and maybe he did not eliminate it when he had the chance precisely for such a time as now, in order to use it against Democrats when the GOP is the minority party. It seems to me that a close reading of your piece implies the bequeathing a filibuster-less majority to the GOP would be a mistake. Underestimating your opponent is always also a mistake, sometimes a fatal one.
Manchin’s concern about the filibuster and his reluctance to climb onto that bandwagon does not make him a “Judas.”
Manchin needs the filibuster as well. His corporate donors are the same ones that the Republicans have. The filibuster gives him cover until the Democrats are safely in the minority again. Otherwise he’d have to actually vote on bills neither he nor his fellow Republicans want.
Speculations on his motives is yet another misdirection from examining his actual argument. Do we really want the GOP to have the power of no filibuster when they are in the majority? Murf’s article evades the question by hoping the GOP can do nothing, filibuster or no filibuster. His hope is not a given.
Perfect Piece Murph. Absolutely irrefutable reasoning. Now if only that putz Manchin wold DO something!
Actually there is no actual reasoning here. He merely evaded the question with the hope that the GOP would be too incompetent to cause harm whether they have filibuster power or not. Hope is not good enough.