My prediction is that the "centrist" Republicans will find ways to swap cloture votes with conservative Democrats so that the filibuster is maintained. The question will be whether the Republicans can round up enough conservative Dems to fill the cloture vote so the centrists in tough states can vote for cloture.

BTW - I'd caution anyone from saying that the Democrats have "60 votes". If one of them is Joe "Talks Smack About Democrats" Lieberman, then they only have 59 votes anyway. One should assume that Lieberman is going to vote against the Democrats until proven otherwise - it's the pragmatic view to take.

I think 58 or so will strip power from the hard right lockstep GOP leadership. A maverick like John McCain will have a lot of clout.

Banana Fana Fo Sixty...

...and there's never a guarantee that everyone in the Democratic caucus will vote together (Lieberman is, after all, part of the caucus).

Thank you.
This is such an obvious bone in the throat, it's a wonder it doesn't get coughed out more often...

A big Dem majority won't help anything progressive get passed. All it does is help keep Republicans from pulling their asinine antics like English-only, Terry Shiavo and anti-flag burning amendments. The Dems are usless for anything like principled action.

A 60-seat majority would be a milestone for the party, but it's hardly a green light to problem-free governing.

Nor is a 58-seat majority a sign that nothing can get done. Assuming the Dem majority actually wants to pass something (not necessarily a given, as we can see from the Lieberman fiasco), it ought to be possible to pick off a few GOP votes.

On the bright side, the Democratic caucus is largely purged of the dixiecrats who helped previous Republican presidents and stymied Clinton. The new non-southern-dominated congress may surprise us.

Given that the economy isn't going to fix itself in the next couple of weeks, the last thing the Repubs are going to want for 2010 is a long list of filibusters that prevented anything from getting done. Would you want to run on this record:

Health Care - filibustered
Financial reform - filibustered
Middle Class tax cuts - filibustered
Carbon emission cuts - filibustered
You name it - filibustered

If McConnell wants to go that route, I can't see any Republicans getting elected in 2010.

This would be a functional majority if we had competent leadership in the senate.

It's going to be damn hard to hold together a 41-vote filibuster with a 42-vote (or less) caucus against anything, let alone against popular legislation backed by a popular president with an absolute popular majority and an email list of 3M donors.

The Senate was on a knife-edge in 2001-2002 and in 2007-2008. But this is going to be very different.

The interesting battles are going to be between liberal Dems and conservative Dems, e.g. Baucus vs Kennedy on healthcare reform, Dingell vs Waxman on climate change. For the moment Republicans have no power and just aren't relevant.

Don't count your 60 before they vote.

There are at least 15 Dim Senators whom I would consider unreliable votes on ANY measure (or, especially, judicial nominees) that smacked in the faintest bit of progressivity or liberalism...

I generally agree with your (Benen) position. A 60 seat majority doesn't just include Loserman, it also contains DINOs (Blue Dogs) that are just GOPers with slightly left of Inquisition positions (the official GOP platform) on social and economic issues. Otherwise, they would be VERY comfortable in Nixon's GOP.

The moderate state GOPers are the ones to be chased after and likely to queer any GOP attempts at asshole filibusters.

Lieberman's vote to allow a filibuster would probably have some consequences. Lieberman's been cut a lot of slack and I think expectations are that he'll behave himself. What's his incentive to vote against? The Republicans are liable to be out of power for at least eight years or longer.

I couldn't agree more. 60 may be a magical number, but who knows where their votes will fall?

Fighting the last war.
If this Lieberman situation proved anything, it is that Obama is leading the Democratic caucus. He decided that Lieberman would not be purged, and thus it was so. Future US Senate action will not be determined by Reid vs. McConnell, but Obama vs. McConnell. Reid will not persuade Spector to vote for cloture; Obama will be doing the persuading.
The game changes when the Executive is with the majority.

The Dems are not going to want to be labeled as another do-nothing congress, so they will find compromises. The Reps will hold together for filibusters on some issues (tax increases, abortion-related ammendments, etc), but as tomek points out, they need to prove something to their constituents besides the fact that they can stop legislation. Therefore, they will make small compromises. With Obama holding a pretty powerful microphone, the age of obstruction will end for at least two years.

Don't forget about the recently snubbed John McCain.

A couple of points:

I think Tom of MA is right that Obama will be calling a lot of the shots in the Senate. As a popular president with a strong majority of the vote behind him, he'll have a lot of pull.

Also, people are talking and writing as if filibusters on all issues were the norm. They've been the norm for the past 2 years, but never before that. With a Democratic president behind them the Senate Dems will have all the reason in the world to call the filibusterers bluff and make them actually filibuster. For the past 2 years, all overcoming a Senate filabuster would do was allow Bush to veto legislation. If you can't overcome a filabuster you can't override a veto. This will no longer be an issue.

And finally, Steve says "there's never a guarantee that everyone in the Democratic caucus will vote together (Lieberman is, after all, part of the caucus)." I'm not sure what his point is. I dislike Lieberman as much as anyone, but give the man his due. He votes with his caucus much more than many a Blue Dog. This is why I thought the panic over keeping Holy Joe in the caucus was so weird. Was he suddenly going to vote with the right wing on social and economic issues if he lost his chairmanship? Is he now going to vote with the left wing on national defense since he gets to keep it? Nothing in this debate ever made sense to me.

Chambliss is going to win the Georgia race -- period, full stop, bet the rent money. He had a three-point lead the first time out despite increased African-American turnout (which won't be repeated). Also, the #3 in the race was a Libertarian, and he may have endorsed Martin, but if a Libertarian drops out, the votes are almost certain to go to the Republican.

So 60? Not gonna happen.