On Thursday night U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was forced to stall a vote on a $410 billion spending package needed to fund the federal government through to September, because he didn’t have enough votes for it in the Senate. It will now be delayed till later this week, to give enough time for Republicans to have their way with it. The reason for the delay? Reid did not have sixty votes. Sixty votes is, of course, the crucial number for any legislation in the Senate, because it prevents a Republican “filibustering” a bill and thus obstructing its passage . As such, it’s a number that could prove the downfall for Obama’s entire legislative agenda.
But it needn’t be like this.
Here’s the situation: Democrats currently have 58 seats in the Senate. 60 votes is needed to prevent any single Republican from “filibustering” any bill. The Democrats could have 59 seats, – leaving only one Republican Senator to be persuaded on any bill – if Minnesota Senator Al Franken was seated. Why isn’t Franken being seated? Because the Republican he defeated in November’s election, Norm Coleman, is refusing to accept the results of January’s recount and is intent on exhausting all his legal appeals. As the Politico notes in a new article “Dems need Franken more than ever”, this makes things very difficult for Harry Reid. Without Franken, it is that much harder to get to 60 votes on anything and thus that much harder to pass President Obama’s vast legislative program.
Except it shouldn’t be like this. Obama’s entire agenda – health care reform, cap and trade, his upcoming enormous budget – should not be under threat because Democrats can’t quite get to 60 votes without serious watering down of any legislation. Indeed, what the Politico article won’t tell you and what you won’t find in the traditional media is the real cause of this problem: the crazy modern day conception of the filibuster.
I first wrote about this back in January in my post Death to the filibuster? which is worth checking out for an extended argument on the background and merits of this archaic Senate tool. Essentially, though, my concluding argument was this: though the filibuster is a useful tool for the minority and thus a historic bulwark against the tyranny of the majority, in its modern day usage it has become an absurd mockery of its original conception. The way it is used today means that, rather than making a Republican who wants to filibuster a bill actually filibuster it, there is instead simply an assumed requirement of 60 votes for any major legislation. This saves Republicans from actually having to do anything while making a mockery of the supposed threshold of a simple majority to pass Senate legislation. Why is this so crucial? Because by actually making Republicans filibuster – making them stand up on the floor of the Senate and talk for hours, in other words – then they would have to face the judgement of the public who, as current polls indicate, rather like President Obama’s agenda, thank you very much. The threat of such an unfavourable public spotlight would therefore put off Republicans from filibustering most of the time, or at least encourage moderate republicans to vote to end a filibuster by one of their more extreme contemporaries.
But forcing Republicans to – gasp! – actually filibuster wouldn’t just solve the problem of GOP obstructionism in the Senate, it would also solve the danger of self-proclaimed “moderate” Senate Democrats trying to throw their weight around by working with their colleagues in the minority to water down Obama’s legislation . We saw this during the battle over the Stimulus package: centrist Democrat Senators like Ben Nelson working with New England Republican Susan Collins to arbitrarily strip provisions from the Economic Recovery Bill. The omens for forthcoming legislation, however, are worse as it appears that Indiana Senator Evan Bayh, an egotist extraordinaire, is attempting to get together a sizeable group of fellow moderate Democrats to act as a sort of pompous levee against the tide of Obama’s ambitions. You can get an idea of the number we’re talking about here.
So would making Republicans filibuster stem the flow of obstructionist moderate democrats? Yes it would, because though they are happy to take the limelight for spearheading compromise talks over major legislation – expecting the praise they consistently get from a media that dotes on bipartisanship – I doubt whether they would enjoy being put in the position of enabling a Republican who, by filibustering Obama’s legislation, would be going against the desires of almost 70% of the population. In other words, apply a little pressure and you’ll get them voting to end any filibuster quicker than you can say “my bipartisan reputation is at stake”. Perhaps I’m wrong on this. But I’d love the chance to find out…
To repeat: make Senators who want to filibuster… filibuster! It’s a simple solution that, in one fell stroke, would alleviate the current obstacles to Obama’s agenda. But Harry Reid won’t do it, because he and the rest of the Democrats are terrified of Republicans. So, thanks to their political cowardice, expect more delays to bills. Expect more compromises. And, unless Franken is seated soon (and even if he is seated soon) expect Obama’s agenda to not make it into law fully entact. Expect healthcare reform to be a little less effective. Expect cap and trade to be a little less stringent. Expect the budget to be a little less ambitious. And expect the Employee Free Choice Act (you know, the bill that stops employers arbitrarily firing union members) to never even make it out the gate.
Like most acts of political cowardice, it’s the people that get hurt, not the politicians.
