Yep, it’s still gotta be embarrassing to be a Republican. Not three votes against a crackpot.
And somehow it’ll all be the Dems’ fault, I’m sure.
And of course, I continue to regard “you Dems shouldn’t consider what happened to Merrick Garland last year, but we Republicans are still pissed about Bork back in 1987” as one of conservatism’s greatest hits.
Nitpick: the Dems really have to defend 25 seats, since the 2 independents (Bernie Sanders and Angus King) are both in that class, and they both caucus with the Dems.
Both are down in the epsilon range of likelihood, so which is more unlikely is immaterial. I’ll commit right now to giving $100 to a tax-deductible charity of your choice in the event that either one happens. File this away, and hold me to it! 
You missed the real Nitpick: Senators are elected from states, not districts. 
But anyway, the Democrats are in a lose-lose situation right now. I don’t think Sam’s poker analogy is apt since you don’t have any chips to worry about here. It might be marginally better to save the filibuster for now, but I think the margin is pretty thin.
You didn’t hear the lyrics correctly.
It’s “You Dems should consider what happened to Merrick Garland last year as caused by Bork back in 1987.”
With lots of intervening shit as well. But that was the first blood in the escalation.
Elephants never forget.
Can someone help me out here? I can understand why both sides of the floor have concerns about the nuclear option but surely the procedure is not irreversible? Coudn’t the Republicans just apply the option and then switch back to the old rule afterwards? If that reversion needed a 60 majority and some Democrats too are so worried by the new rule then one would think it would not be hard to get enough votes to reverse it? I would have thought anything the Senate can do they can undo. From reading the press one would imagine that once the procedure was changed it was set in stone for ever.
So what am I missing here? What’s the big deal?
In my understanding, the Republicans can change the rules with a simple majority. Sure, they could change them back afterwards, but what would be the point? It would be obvious to all that they’re willing to change the rules at any time, which would mean that functionally the filibuster no longer can block anything.
I take your point. I guess the fact is that the filibuster, with or without a rule change, is pretty toothless as it can always be overcome by the majority party in the Senate if enough of them wish it.
To me, far better to reinstitute the talking filibuster, requiring actual physical endurance and pain to execute. Then the majority can wait it out, if they think it’s important enough.
Yeah. We need Kirk and a taste of armageddon.
I don’t understand the reference, therefore I can’t tell if you’re being snarky or not.
In Star Trek: The Original Series, there was an episode (I think first season) called “A Taste of Armageddon.”
Kirk and the Enterprise encounter two planets that claim to be at war, yet there’s no sign of destruction or damage to their buildings or ecology. They learn that the war is being conducted under a strict treaty: war gaming computers calculate the results of notional bomb attacks, and the people that lived in the zone who would have been killed then report to disintegration chambers. This allows the war to proceed without the messy effects of property damage and long-term ecological destruction.
The Enterprise, in orbit, is deemed to have been struck by an attack, and Kirk is ordered to deliver his whole crew up for disintegration.
Instead, he destroys the war gaming computers. Aghast, the planetary leader tells him something like, “Don’t you realize what you’ve done? The enemy will assume we’re abrogating the treaty! They’ll use real weapons against us; we’ll have no choice but to respond in kind!”
And Kirk agrees, telling them that they’ve made war acceptable by making it so clinical and painless. He’s forced them to confront what war really means. If they want war, they’re have real war, real destruction.
Or, he says, he could help them broker a peace - a peace he suspects their enemies will be eager for as well.
So, you are telling us that the only way for us to get our government straightened out is to have aliens from another star come and destroy our “civilized” institutions, forcing us to either go anarchic and kill each other in the streets, or learn to come to an understanding with each other?
I think I actually remember that episode. I don’t remember how it ended, though. I assume the creators meant us to believe that it ended in peace, but I would assume that as soon as the Enterprise was out of orbit, the nukes started flying.
Though, good idea for a continuing movie franchise. Mad Max 3: Pennsylvania Avenue.
Well in that case, why don’t we take it back to Clement Haynesworth? It’s not like Bork’s the first SCOTUS nominee to ever get voted down by the full Senate.
It’s time you guys grew the fuck up, and let Bork go. He got voted down in committee, and shouldn’t have even gotten a Senate vote. But he insisted on one, and he lost that too. Bigly. And then Anthony Kennedy was nominated and unanimously confirmed. Really, get the fuck over it.
I don’t think you understand how voting works. It’s a democratic institution that we’re all happy with until you peasants start voting the wrong way, which we can’t have. No more voting for you! Really, it’s your own fault.
Shit, I can’t believe I let that one slip.
I’ll just pretend I was leaving that one for you.
Yeah, to me it’s more about Dems versus themselves, based on what I regard as the fact that the Dems aren’t nearly as willing as the GOP to throw longstanding rules and traditions out the window when it suits them, and feel more constrained by the opinions of the big papers and the Sunday morning political talk shows.
If they were equally willing, I’d say the decision to filibuster now or save it for later really wouldn’t matter. If I could trust that the Dems would get rid of the SCOTUS filibuster in 2021 if we had a Dem President and non-filibuster-proof Senate majority and a SCOTUS vacancy that year, I’d shrug my shoulders and say this vote didn’t matter. But I don’t believe that for a second, so I want them to make the GOP kill the filibuster now, so it won’t be in the Dems’ way later.
Like the Eagles’ song goes, “so oftentimes it happens that we live our lives in chains, and we never even know we have the key.” That’s the Dems in a nutshell, and that’s why they have to use this one weird trick to get the GOP to break the chains for them.
So Bricker, got any excuse for why your party won’t manage three Senators to vote against a crackpot when one is nominated to SCOTUS? I’m still eager to hear this one.
I don’t agree with the assumption. That is, I don’t agree that three GOP Senators would fail to vote against a crackpot.
Thanks. Now I remember that episode, actually.
I think this means you’re agreeing with me, right?