Respect for Decorum
Saturday 9 March 2013 - Filed under Uncategorized
When even the slimy Harry Reid publicly acknowledges that what you, a republican senator hated by those on both sides of the aisle, have done is important, and that what you’ve done was done in exactly the way it’s designed to be done, yo know you scored a victory.
My Republican colleagues love to extol the virtues of regular order. If only we could get back to regular order, they say, and the Senate would function again. Yesterday we saw both sides of that. On the one hand, my colleagues did practice regular order. On the other, they didn’t. Let’s take the one they didn’t. They demanded a 60-vote threshold for confirmation of a very qualified nominee, Caitlin Halligan. The Republicans once again hid behind a cloture vote, a filibuster by another term, to prevent a simple up-or-down vote on this important nomination. They took the easy way out. On the other hand, one Republican senator did return to regular order and as his right he spoke for as long as he was able to speak. And, Mr. President, that is a filibuster. After 12 hours standing and talking, this is how Senator Paul ended his filibuster, and I quote, “I would go for another 12 hours to try to break Strom Thurmond’s record, but I have discovered there are some limits to filibustering, and I am going to have to take care of one of those in a few moments here.” I have been involved in a few filibusters, as Rand Paul did yesterday. And what I have learned from my experiences in talking filibusters is this: To succeed, you need strong convictions but also a strong bladder. It’s obvious Senator Paul has both. Mr. President, we should all reflect on what happened yesterday as we proceed with other nominations, including a lot of judicial nominations. This can be a Senate where ideas are debating in full public view and obstruction happens in full public view as well, or it can be a Senate where a couple senators, obstruction from behind closed doors without ever coming to the Senate floor.
Well done, Senator Paul. You invited open debate on a matter that many Americans never even knew existed, and you did it in the way such things should be done.
2013-03-09 » madlibertarianguy