Republicans On Track For Record Number of Filibusters
Saturday July 21, 2007
On Wednesday, I put together a table showing cloture motions filed since 1973. In this, the 110th, Congress, there have already been 49 motions for cloture. The most in any two-years was the 104th (1995-1996) with 82.
On Friday, McClatchy projected that 158 cloture motions are possible for the 110th Congress, if Republicans continue threatening filibuster at the current rate,
A cloture motion is filed to try to stop debate. To stop debate in the Senate requires 60 votes. With effectively a 51-49 majority, Democrats have trouble pulling together the 60 votes required to stop debate and call for a vote.
Although Iraq is possibly the most visible bone of contention, Republicans have used the filibuster to block votes on legislation dealing with immigration, energy, labor rights and prescription drugs. They also used it to block a vote of no-confidence on Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.
Comments
And it’s a good thing, that cloture motion device. The looney lefties and the spineless Rino’s need to be curbed.
Most of the bills named in this piece should be withdrawn or flushed. They’re just bad policy. Senate has no business dictating how a President wages war. This senate also had the immigration/amnesty bill all wrong. The no-confidence vote against Gonzales was just another tool for posturing and grandstanding by a bunch of slimey politicians.
So, way to go Republicans. Keep stopping those fruity ideas from the far left kooks.
C
To “C”: Hmmm, that’s funny. Your party had no problem stopping my party from doing the same thing. Could it be because we wanted to stop YOU from implementing BAD ideas, HMMMM?
Veronica,
Using the same logic, that would mean that the Libs have come up with a lot more Bad ideas? HMMMMM? OK, you win the Bad idea debate.
The Republicans seem to think either that the ideas are bad - or that they do not want to have to go on record voting for/against them.
Historically, filibuster has been used in especially divisive issues like civil rights, voting rights, Vietnam .. and now Iraq. I don’t know where stem cell legislation fits in the historical record.
Go with your first impression. They’re bad.
Historical record? Since the 90’s? Not really historical I would say. And aborting life is a very divisive topic.
Jughead, you wrote:
I hesitate to make any connection between your handle and the fact that you could not have read either the blog post OR the data table OR the referenced news article before typing this.
MY data (copied from Senate records) go back to 1973. It’s there, in the first sentence of the blog post:
How you got “90s” out of this I do not understand.
The McClatchy story uses data for another decade — going back to 1963.
The Senate website does not provide data any earlier than 1963.
Stem cell research didn’t become a serious issue till the 90’s. So your comment to stem cell research fitting into any equation is just a red herring. Maybe you should be wearing my handle?
Well Jughead, as you have appropriately named yourself, how have the last 8 years been going? The monkey man and his neo-con handlers have left this country in the worst shape financially, geopolitically, and morally since the great depression. War profiteers and their friends have exported our treasure to Dubai and China and have left us bankrupt. God, please give us a filibuster proof Democratic congress!!!
Left-Wing Kooks? Excuse me? I am a lefty, a real liberal, and for those of you who obviously don’t know what that means, it means that my politics are all about preserving civil liberties, which BOTH sides of the aisle are manifestly NOT so concerned about. Ergo, they are almost universally NOT REAL LIBERALS. REAL LIBERALS would be abolishing the “PATRIOT” act by any means necessary. -But at least the Democrats are trying to fix some of the damage done to this country by a Republican party that has been hijacked by extremists, fascists, and domestic terrorists. The only reason you could actually think that there are members of the “Left Wing” in Congress, is that you’ve been shown nothing but far-Right, psycho-capitalist, Dominionist, chicken-hawk propaganda for so long, that you mistakenly confuse centrists with the Left. The Republicans have broken all records for filibusters, because the centrists want to play fair, and the sad thing is that they are too good at heart to realize the kind of Nazis they are dealing with. -Or did we all forget the “nuclear option” so soon? If we get a filibuster-proof Democratic Congress, you watch. The Far-Righties will be whining good and loud about the same kind of treatment they’ve been handing the Democrats, and those in their own party who show any sense. Left-Wing Kooks, my butt! You modern-day NeoCONs wouldn’t know a liberal, let alone a true lefty, if you were beaten to death with one.