Terry Gross had Boyden Gray on the show today to talk about the Committee for Justice, which gives support to the administration’s judicial nominees. He was giving his side of the fillibustering situation, and countering yesterday’s guest, who was from a liberal group.
The debate here is: Do Gray’s stances hold water, and was he rather shrewdly evasive of some questions?
I think he said the use of the fillibuster isn’t right because no judicial nominee has ever been defeated through the use of one. Why does this make the technique wrong?
He appeared to answer some questions using a very particular word in a very careful manner. The word “mainstream” was used a lot, where I think it would have been more appropriate to discuss what was correct legally.
And in one exchange about the vetting of appointees by the Federalist Society, he gave a rather long pause and seemed to get flustered when Gross changed the term “vetting” to “consultation”.
In all, Gray seemed extremely “lawer-ly” - I was reminded of Martin Short’s attorney character on SNL being interviewed by Mike Wallace. And I’m still not really straight on why he thinks fillibusters, as used in the appointment process, are bad.
I listened to this and was almost screaming at my radio.
to sloppily paraphrase:
Gray: No judge has ever been successfully blocked with a filabuster. PERIOD. So the Dem’s are evil for trying.
Gross: But didn’t Bill Frist and ___ attempt to do it to ________ (forget name used) on _____ date?
Gray: But that didn’t succeed! (repeat line 1 over and over)
It sounded as if his argument was that because repubs tried but failed, it was the end of balance in govt as we know it for dems to even try (i guess he thinks they’d succeed at it where repubs had failed). She kind of made him sound like an ass at that point, though didn’t have to try very hard because of his general attitude and caustic way of talking to her.
So the answer to your statement: “And I’m still not really straight on why he thinks fillibusters, as used in the appointment process, are bad.” apparently is … “because the other guy is using it!”
On the other hand … I thought he did at least have something to stand on in principal, with the idea that the filibuster is a sham anyway (my words). Much as I loathe it, we are in a situation where the majority of people WANT (and voted for) what the repubs are selling … even if it may seem obviously terrible to those of us more enlightened folks. ;oP And if The People have elected this many repubs, then it serves logic that they would want them appointing psycho-conservative judges left and right (right and right?). So the dems trying to stop appointments at this point by forcing a majority of 60 is somewhat unjust (even if it may be the right thing to do…).
I do not understand the history of the filibuster, but the idea sounds as if, by design, the founders wanted some way for the minority to not get run over. (or was it maybe added later on?) But isn’t that contrary to the idea of Majority Rule? If The People have been so dumb as to put all the power in one group’s hands, then they deserve to learn the folly of that choice.
I heard that interview. Gray came across as quite a jerk!
Your assessment of him being “lawerly” was exactly what I was thinking. He kept harping that no judicial nominee had been defeated by a fillibuster. Terry Gross pointed out that Republicans had fillibustered Clinton judicial nominees, and Gray went nuts screaming about how it has NEVER happened that a judicial nominee had been defeated. Just because the Republicans were unsuccessful at it doesn’t mean they weren’t doing the same thing. Now, all of a sudden, it’s a shameful technique.
I usually root for the conservative guy on NPR, but that dude was coming off as a total ass.
Terry Gross has been one of my favorite interviewers for some time now. I’m beginning to be less enthusiastic about her interviews with political figures, though. She didn’t sound very well prepared for the Gray interview – or she was too intimidated to ask her questions succinctly.
Gray seemed above all to be as a zealous advocate of the double standard. His initial and principle argument against the filibuster was that judicial appointees should get a straight up or down vote. As Agent Cooper points out, Gray excuses Republicans past attempts to use the filibuster to prevent an up or down vote on the basis that they failed. Gray talked over or ignored Gross’s attempts to put to him the numerous times Republicans had denied Clinton appointees a straight up or down vote by not voting them out of committee or similar procedural machinations. If, as Gray claims, using Senate rules and procedural machinations to prevent a floor vote on judicial appointments is wrong, he must admit that it was wrong for Republicans to use committee votes and to attempt to use filibuster to do so. Otherwise, he defaults on any claim to intellectual honesty or the moral high ground.
A) Boyden Gray is a terrible interview. Always has been.
B) Terry Gross drives me bananas with her interview style. I wish she didn’t inject (or make apparent) her own views on political subjects. It’s pretty clear she’s a lefty and gets argumentative in her interviews with folks on the other side.
I heard part of the interview, Gray did sound very cautious in what he said. Didn’t bother me all that much, I’m used to politspeak. What DID bother me was the notion that the Dems were wrong for filibustering. Until the Senate’s role in confirming judicial nominees is changed from “advise and consent” to “rubber stamp” they are allowed whatever legal means they might want to use to make their point.
I heard that interview, too. Luckily, I had to leave my car before I wnet from groaning to screaming.
“No nominee has ever been defeated by a filibuster.”
Of course not, because a filibuster isn’t a vote. There are plenty of nominees who never got to a vote because of filibusters. Both parties have done it.
“Abe Fortas was on the floor for five days. He wasn’t filibustered.”
That’s correct. Fortas was on the floor, the nomination was being filibustered and Fortas withdrew because he was political enough to understand that he wasn’t going to sail through confirmation, if he could even be confirmed at all. But it was the same result. Because of a filibuster, he never even got to a vote.
I heard portions of the interview and was annoyed. Although why Terry Gross didn’t bring up the changes to the Senate Judiciary Committee rules that forced the democrats’ hand (rule IV’s applicability, blue slips) seems to be giving her guest a free ride -allowing him to frame the issue as being a narrow one regarding judicial nomination filibuster. Perhaps she brought it up after I stopped listening.
Much as I like her, I have to agree that Gross seemed rather sheepish (and often can with other subjects too). I figure that if the guy came off as that obnoxious through my radio, how bad must she have had it sitting across from him? (Assuming their studio puts them face to face.) And yes, she does make her own view more obvious than many interviewers do.
I also put some faith into the saying “Never argue with an idiot. They’ll bring you down to their level and beat you with experience.” From the encounter they were having, I would have had to get up, throw my hands in the air, laugh out loud, and leave. If all she did was get sheepish, she’s better off on the air than I would be for sure.
I have a couple nitpicks here. It is the rule requiring a supermajority to end debate ( a “cloture” vote ) that is undemocratic. Getting rid of it, whether a good or a bad idea, is democratic. And it isn’t Frist who will change the rules because he, as Majority Leader, could only do so by introducing a rule change that would require the approval of 2/3 of the Senate. Instead what will happen, if the “nuclear option” goes down, is that the presiding officer, likely Cheney himself in this case or at least the Speaker Pro Tempore, will rule that cloture only requires a bare majority and not 3/5 of the Senate. This ruling will be challenged by the Dems and upheld by a straight majority vote.
I’m on the record here as saying it won’t happen. I don’t think it will because conservatives have been enormously sucessful in turning the federal judiciary to the right since the heyday of the New Deal. When they control the White House they nominate as many reactionary rightwingers as possible and when they aren’t they block the moderate and any rare liberal candidates the Democratic president nominates in the Senate. If they are in the majority they just bottle these nominations up in committee and when they are in the minority they try to use the various procedures of the Senate to block them. Most of these procedures have already been 86ed as MMI alluded to. Only the filibuster remains.
If they do change the rule then Democrats have no say at all in who gets a judgeship right now but when the worm turns and the Dems control the Senate and White House the Repubs will be completely shut out. There might be some actual liberals on the federal bench again. It’s a bad idea for the Repubs because they care a lot more about judicial nominees that the Dems do. Dems have problems blocking conservative nominees because many Democratic Senators ARE conservative. Normal conservatives don’t get filibustered. The Dems can only block the most unacceptable reactionaries. The Repubs, OTOH, when they are in the minority, can muster up enough votes to filibuster moderate or liberal justices by ignoring the handful of moderate Republican Senators and joining with the many conservative Democrats.
So there really is no good reason for the GOP to bite the hand that feeds them. Not that they won’t do so, of course. Perhaps they really do think they will be on top forever.
Considering the casual way they have treated the Democratic process in the last couple of election, and the widespread use of unauditable voting technology, maybe you’re on to something …
It was intended to allow unlimited debate on a subject, but that is not really how it has been used. Its most famous uses have been to keep a bill that is unpalatable to the minority from coming to a vote. Some instances of which I agree with, some I do not. In short, it has been used to keep the will of the majority from eclipsing the perceived rights of the minority.
That said, I personally dislike the current rules that keep the act of filibustering from actually happening. They now merely require the persons intending to filibuster notify the senate leadership they intend to filibuster, and life in the senate goes on without a vote on the subject. I would rather that the filibuster require that the persons intending to filibuster actually bring business in the senate to a stop by debating on the floor. I feel that would be a sufficiently high barrier to applying the filibuster frivolously. It seems to me it would make a cloture vote easier to get, since there would undoubtedly be some business that the minority would like to attend to.