Should Republicans kill the filibuster?

[Valin]

Washington Examiner:

Hugh Hewitt

February 15, 2015

 

To invoke, or not to invoke, the "Reid Rule?" That is the singe most important question facing Senate Republicans.

 

Simply put, if destroying what is left of the Senate's tradition of the filibuster would save the country from terrible crises and hardship, almost every senator of both parties would vote to abolish it.

 

Indeed, all but one of the currently serving Senate Democrats who also served in 2013 voted with their leader to break the filibuster rule by simple majority, thus creating "the Reid Rule" that the rules of the Senate can be modified by a simple majority of the senators present. (West Virginia's Joe Manchin voted against breaking the filibuster then, along with Carl Levin and Mark Pryor — the former retired, the latter was defeated in November.)

 

(Snip)

 

The filibuster is not part of the Constitution, however, and all that ever preserved it was a bipartisan sense of the necessity of maintaining a tradition that honored the role of the minority in a long-enduring Republic. Now with the president embarked on an unconstitutional abdication of his oath to faithfully execute the laws, along with his adventures with Cuba and Iran that have many in his own party alarmed, the question is squarely presented: Does the near term of the Republic's future outweigh the long term interests of the Senate?

 

In the past week I have heard from two former senators and one theologian on this key debate. Both senators are greatly respected for their intellects and integrity — former Colorado Sen. Bill Armstrong and former Missouri Sen. Jim Talent — but they differ on the subject of whether the Mitch McConnell-led Republicans ought to clear away what is left of the wreckage of the filibuster by invoking the Reid Rule to end filibusters on legislative matters as well as nominations. The theologian, Phoenix Seminary's Wayne Grudem, is known as the country's pre-eminent systematic theologian and a prolific and thoughtful political essayist as well.

 

(Snip)

[Cyber_Liberty]

I think Harry Reid should be publicly asked about this. Let his answer be heard all across the land. Then we'll do what we want after peeing on his leg.

[Valin]

Abolish the filibuster

Charles Krauthammer

Feb. 19 2015

 

I’ve been radicalized. By Harry Reid and Barack Obama. Goodbye moderation and sweet reason. No more clinging to constitutional and procedural restraint. It’s time to go nuclear.

 

In the fourth quarter of his presidency, Obama unbound is abusing presidential authority at will to secure a legacy on everything from environmental regulation to immigration, the laws of which he would unilaterally suspend.

 

(Snip)

 

I know that breaks a lot of china. But Congress is already knee-deep in fractured porcelain. On policy, Obama has repeatedly usurped congressional power, most egregiously with an executive amnesty for illegal immigrants that for four years he himself had insisted was unlawful (a view given significant support this week in a federal district court).

 

As for procedure, then-majority leader Reid (D-Nev.) went nuclear in November 2013 when he abolished the filibuster for presidential appointees and judicial nominees (below the Supreme Court). He did it to pack the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals with liberals. The nation’s liberal chorus cheered. “Elections are supposed to have consequences,” read one typical commentary. “It was time to push the button.” Boom.

 

(Snip)

 

 

 

H/T The Three Martini Lunch