I say let them actually mount a real filibuster. Let them talk 24/7 until they turn blue while America watches.

Seems to me that the Senate has not actually held a filibuster; just threatened one. I agree with Dean: force them to actually filibuster and at least those Americans who care to pay attention will see a demonstration of the ignorance of these people. Unfortunately, the Dems will also be held up to ridicule as they are allowing this to take place without any real push back.

Key phrase:

because some Democrats are conservatives who are comfortable with failure

Arcane Senate rules are their security blanket, the one that allows them to campaign as Democrats and govern as Republicans. Nice trick.

I agree with the premise of this post in that the senate is basically a failed legislative body that no longer serves the purpose it was created for. BUT, the bottom line is the senate had the same rules it does now when Bu$h got everything the conservative movement ever wanted, and they rammed it down the throats of the democrats and the rest of America.

Said in a different way, the democratic senators are wimps that are too afraid of losing the gravy train that is their job. And the rest of the democratic leadership (White House on down), is allowing themselves to be bullied by a party that has been soundly and thoroughly repudiated in 2 straight elections.

Pass the bill with reconciliation, all you need is 51 votes. Do it, get it done, or go down in history as the generation of leaders that failed America.

I agree with Dean. Let them put up or shut up. Two things happen if they really have to take the floor and hold it. One is they have their strength of will tested, two, the business of government grinds to a halt. When they have to shut down the Senate or all other business, there will be a price that those who join the filibuster will have to pay in bad press. When Newt led the GOP in shutting down the federal government in 1995 and 1996, it was the obstructionist party that took the heat, and it will be the same with an extended filibuster.

The way things are now, where all you have to do is declare your intention to filibuster, the minority party can hold the Senate hostage without cost or consequence. Time to end the farce.

Although I recognize it's not an executive action, institutional reform would be the kind of change that a lot of us who voted for Obama could get behind.

I believe that we're voters that the Democratic party is trying to figure out how to mobilize for midterm elections.

I would also add the majority of the media leans republican. It is hard to push a liberal agenda when the media frames the issues in a republican friendly way.

Look at cable news. Fox, MSNBC, and CNN. Of the 72 hours in a day just three hours are hosted by liberals. Yes Kieth Olbermann and Rachel are rebroadcast but it still is like seven hours of liberals versus 65 for conservatives. Kind of like the 90% of talk radio is conservative.

Washington has two daily papers. The conservative Washington Post and the far right Washington Times. How is this helpful to push a liberal agenda.

In 33 and 65 there were liberal papers in Washington and the conservative cable networks had not yet been unleashed.

As others keep pointing out, make the Republicans filibuster. Shut the government down over the issue.

Congress stared down Bush I over the budget, shut down the government and Bush and Republicans in congress blinked. Dems got what the wanted. Clinton stared down Gingrinch over the budget, shut down the government and Gingrinch blinked. Clinton got what he wanted. Republicans are little more than bullies. One good punch to the nose and standing up to them with conviction will make them back down as it has done in the past.

The United States Clown Car Senate is a body that operates under human-made rules and procedures. The near-total dysfunction of that institution deteriorates our country's democracy, and causes untold misery for untold millions of citizens due to the shirking by these Clowns of any responsibility in addressing and resolving a myriad of problems. It is criminal.

That the Dims allow the Repugnants to -- for most intents and purposes -- shut down the government makes them complicit.

Maybe if some Aztec priest would kidnap Joe Lieberman and cut his heart out on a cold stone alter to the sun god, the Clown Car would be healed. It's worth a try...

The system wouldn't be a problem if the players didn't make it one, and some of these procedures protect the minority.

The real issue is that modern Republican's are not interested in participatory democracy. When they're in power, it's "my way or the highway" and when they're in the minority, they simply keep the majority from functioning.

When Republicans once again are in the majority Dems will be glad to have some protection. That's not to say there couldn't be some tweaking, but simple majorities aren't good either.

If Dems had a decent message machine, they could expose the obstruction for what it is and take care of the problem at its source.

The problem is there are no moderate Republicans. There are lots of conservative Democrats.

Two strong pieces. I was surprised that Meyerson mentioned Landrieu, Nelson and Lincoln but skipped Lieberman. I suspect that was a wholly practical decision. Meyerson sent out a call to do the right thing. Lieberman is beyond reaching; those three may not be.

Maybe we should take a note from the text and see if we can get the media to pick up on the fact the filibuster is NOT in the Constitution and is simply as Senate rule which can in theory be changed with 51 votes.

Amen! Amen! Amen! How much longer must we tolerate this obstructionism before we decide the entire Senate, as a legislative body, is no longer functional and is a body we'd be much better off without.

The House better represents the population and members are elected every 2yrs making them more responsive to the people's needs and wants.

I would love to see the senate disbanded for they have turned into a body more detrimental to our nation than helpful.

When will someone do something about our dysfunctional senate?

All of this totally misses the point. The Senate is not dysfunctional. It operates exactly as it is designed to. It has two complementary objectives (1) make it as difficult as possible to challenge incumbents (2) extract huge economic rents from interests seeking governmental favors. Every Senate rule that people are objecting to directly serves these objectives. The Senate will (collectively) resist every "reform", that undermines the leverage individual members might have in certain situations, creates greater visibility/accountability for positions on controversial issues, reduces the motherlode of special interest donations that make incumbent challenges so difficult, or weakens the committee/seniority type systems that kill any incentives for internal reform.
Democrats like Obama, Clinton et al are as dedicated to the preservation of this status quo.

Facing extraordinary crises and challenges, the United States has a legislative branch that is barely able to legislate at all. -- Steve Benen

Rubbing salt into the wound, that's the branch which sucks harder at my taxpayer teat, too.

As Pearlstein noted, "most days" the D.C. insiders "barely notice how utterly ridiculous and ineffective the legislative process has become."

I think it's worse than that. I think that a lot of the key legislators feel that much of their personal power comes from their in-depth knowledge and experience negotiating the arcane rules they have set up for themselves, and they fear two things about reform.

First they don't know if their personal power will survive any successful reform effort. Second, they can't predict a lot of other possible results of reform, so they feel safer with the status quo.

Since the rules are so arcane and irrational, no one outside the D.C. establishment really knows specifically what should be changed or how to do it. So they ignore the whole thing. That's safe and unlikely to cause them political grief. Any major change or improvement can only be bad news for the insiders.

I'm sorry, but the biggest problem in the Senate is Harry Reid, who should be bringing on mass quantites of pain and suffering, rather than honoring bullshit holds and cowering before threatened filibusters.

Cancel the holiday recess, and keep calling for cloture until their bladders bust. Make THEM the media story of the day/week/month. Whatever it takes.

In principle you have budget reconciliation, but even that seems to require a filibusterable motion to proceed with 60 votes required. It is ridiculous.

Let me echo beep52 and hhoran. The problem isn't the Senate or its rules, however imperfect they may be. The problem is that one of this country's two major political parties is currently dominated by people who are either...

A. Crazy

B. A-holes

or...

C. Some combination of A and B.

That's the source of the problem. The abuse of Senate procedure is just the symptom. It doesn't matter how you treat the symptom, if you don't fix things at the source, the problem will continue and probably get worse.

Mike

I say we make Reid's re-election in 2010 into a referendum on the filibuster. If he doesn't find a way to kill it before the August recess in 2010, progressives don't show up on election day.

The Senate should be reduced to a non-legislative debating society that solely *advises* and has no power. Now somebody's going to argue that the framers of the Constitution didn't really grant the House the power to amend and abolish. Go ahead: read it.

doubtful educated me on Senate holds in a previous thread. Here's the definition of a hold from the Senate website (emphasis mine):

"An informal practice by which a Senator informs his or her floor leader that he or she does not wish a particular bill or other measure to reach the floor for consideration. The Majority Leader need not follow the Senator's wishes, but is on notice that the opposing Senator may filibuster any motion to proceed to consider the measure."

In short, holds have only as much value Harry Reid gives them. Good to know the next time that we learn about an appointment or legislation being put on hold while Reid pretends that moving forward is outside his control.

On the issue of the filibuster, I think they should be like sideline challenges in the NFL. Keep them, but significantly limit them.

Change every instance of Democrat to Republican and vice versa and this comment thread, almost word-for-word, could appear in any right-leaning blog back when it was the Democrats threatening filibuster.

What goes around comes around, I guess.

The comments on this post illustrate the problem. People (even hyper-informed commenters) don't know the nitty gritty of how the senate works.

Senators staying up all night reading the phone book is a Hollywood fantasy. Under present rules you do not need to say a word. A filibustering senator can sit silent on the floor, occasionally requesting a quorum call to keep the other side from leaving the room. Under present rules it is much easier to filibuster than to fight a filibuster.

The rules need to be changed all right, but doing so will require a showdown. The present rules favor the monority party and so the minority will fight change with all they-ve got, and they fight under rules that favor them. A Democrat led 'nuclear option' could change the rules with 51 votes, but recall that the Democrats promised to shut down the Senate if the Republicans did the nuclear option. The Republicans will do the same. The nuclear option has its name for a reason.

Everyone remembers that Newt Gingrich lost big when he let the government grind to a halt in his showdown with Clinton. Keeping 51 senators onboard in a high stakes showdown with the Republicans requires groundwork so the public sees the need for the showdown. As Steve Benen says at present the public has no idea there is a problem. Thety don't know the Senate has become a 60 vote body. If Democrats forced a showdown now the public at large will not support them, there won't be 51 votes for a rule change, and the Democrats will look like failures (again, remember Newt).

How to educate the public?

1. Write about the problem. (Thanks Steve and Matt and others)

2. Let the Republicans shut down the Senate over a particularly stupid filibuster. Let them sit on the floor and do quorum calls. After a few days it will become a big news story. The public will then see what a filibuster looks like (not at all like Jimmy Stewart as Mr. Deeds) and they will read all sorts of analysis pieces because they will want to know why the Senate is shut down. They will see that the rules are biased in favor of the filibustering party. HOWEVER, this story will be played as a referandum on the filobuster (which it is) so the Democrats need to make sure they will outlast the Republicans before they make the first step. If a showdown ends with the Democrats folding it will be a tremendous gift to the Republicans and will further entrench the filibuster.

3. Go for DC statehood to address government by obstruction. People will understand a new state, and they understand obstruction. A real push will get a lot of press coverage which the Democrats need to keep focused on structural problems in the Senate. Thos stories will be read and absorbed and will have the effect of educating the public about Senatorial dysfunction. Finally, DC would be a permanent Democratic state compensating a bit fot places like the Dakotas and Wyoming.

The problem is that right now unemployment is 10% and we are losing a war in Afghanistan. The public at large is unlikely to look sympathetically on a rules shakeup in the Senate for some time to come.

The number one rule in a democracy: Politicians will do what they ahve to to be re-elected. A lot of ground needs to be tilled, and the tilling will no bear fruit for a long time.

Change every instance of Democrat to Republican and vice versa and this comment thread, almost word-for-word, could appear in any right-leaning blog back when it was the Democrats threatening filibuster.

Yeah, as long as you think that all that matters is what people say, not whether it's actually true.

- Democrats did not mount nearly double the record number of filibusters in a session.

- Democrats did not routinely filibuster actions they had no intention of opposing when they came up for a vote, or put holds on nominees who were so uncontroversial as to be eventually approved unanimously.

- etc.

Just as with conservative complaints about Democratic deficits when their last three presidents have racked up as much debt as all other presidents combined, the distinction is that conservatives are simply lying. (Or, since we're talking about wingnut bloggers, they may simply not be bright enough to figure out that they're being lied to.)

One factor in common the parties involved have is resistance to change. The elected politicians have the material comforts they need with the current system, and complaints from constituents can be tuned out. Systemic problems like the mounting deficit can be pushed back indefinitely. If current policies lead to economic/political catastrophe, then there will be change -- but that change will be too late, of course.

SRS

Chris actually alluded to it, but didn't quite blast it home enough (IMNSHO):

holds [and other Senate procedures] have only as much value Harry Reid gives them.

These aren't things embedded into the heart of the Constitution, nor are they enshrined in law and punishable by jail time.

They're f***ing arbitrary and informal rules that are only as enforceable as the person in charge of the game. That's it. They're like fraternity rules, or Monopoly rules, or any other set of rules that can be changed if there's the will.

But there's not.

Democrats lack the guts to stand up to this farce because even they don't want to lose the power a single Senator can hold.

It's that power, that sense of importance, that "Oh, I'm a Senator" that's rotting the legislative process. Lieberman, Baucus, Snowe, all of them love being the center of the political world's attention, and they're the only ones other than the Prez who can do it so easily.

And while I'd love for it to stop, it won't any time soon without something super-duper drastic happening.

It's just too damn hard for them to give up that kind of power ...

I could understand David Broder's paeans to a bygone era of bipartisanship and comity if he actually stated what was gained during those times. The primary benefit was that senators would only use the filibuster or hold in extreme situations. A vote for cloture was a vote to end debate not a vote to permit a vote on a bill. Everyone understood that the constitution did not require a supermajority of senators to agree on any particular issue.

I my opinion civility is allowing a vote on an issue that you may lose. Its playing by the rules. It has nothing to do with eating quail with Karl Rove.

Nice post, tomtom.

Oppose 49.5
Favor 41.8
http://www.pollster.com/polls/us/healthplan.php

Perhaps the above might give a Senator pause.

And proof that the Senate is functioning exactly as intended.

Interesting that gentleman dead for two centuries or so have more insight on the present situation on the ground than the American left; and more wisdom than the current American left, and the Alinskyites in the House, by several orders of magnitude.

Amend the constitution.

The idea of forcing them to actually have a filibuster is more painful on the party being filibustered than on the filibusterers because of the rules for the number of people who have to be in attendance. There would only have to be one of the filibusters present to keep it going while the rest got a good night's sleep.

Now if cloture could be invoked by 60% of those present and voting, then it would force the GOP to actually show up in force, stay there the whole time for fear that the Democrats would be summoned once the Republicans went home to sleep, and that would be a lot more of a hardship on them.

Remember the "Nuclear Option?"

I was in favor of it when the Republicans wanted it. As I remember, they got most of what they wanted anyway. I also knew that it would come back to bite the Republicans in the ass in a big way and in a big hurry.

Now, it is time to pass some legislation, to fight battles that Harry Reid would rather "fight the good fight" in and lose, wringing his impotent hands all the while. I am SOOOO sick of his whine! I remember he sounded a lot more forceful when he was dissing leftist bloggers.

How inconvenient for him that he is up for re-election next year! He has to try like hell to appease his real enemies - the left - while undermining us in every possible way he thinks he can get away with, all the while trying to run as a Democrat!

Unenviable position - couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

Since he is (a) another warm body, (b)he is unlikely to lose a primary challenge to any real Democrat and (c) the Republican will be much worse, I would actually be willing to contribute to his re-election - but only if he immediately resigns his position as majority leader in favor of a real Democrat!