Comments on: Reid and Frist Working on Judicial Vote Compromise

By: McGehee

McGehee — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 18:44:52 +0000

When 60 of Bushâs nominations are stopped through fillibustering, then the right will have a moral leg to stand on.

I'm interested to see the news accounts of Republicans using the filibuster to stop 60 Clinton nominations. When you can show me that, I'll accept your flimsy attempt at moral equivalence argument.

By: Barry

Barry — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 17:29:31 +0000

McGehee, good point. I've found several references where it was mentioned as being occasionally used by the Democrats. Nothing on the order of 60 nominations stopped, though. When 60 of Bush's nominations are stopped through fillibustering, then the right will have a moral leg to stand on. Not till then, though. And 'Every single Clinton judicial nominee who was approved by the judiciary committee got an up-or-down floor vote' is just sleight of hand. The GOP enthusiastically used a non-democratic method to stop people from becoming judges. A method less democratic than a fillibuster. A method which Hatch suddenly developed a distate for when the Democratic Senators had a chance to. It isn't even original - I found a comment on RedState.org where somebody defended it, while denouncing the fillibuster as non-democratic

By: From the Left

From the Left — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 16:26:00 +0000

Someone call the irony police. Senator Isakson (R-GA) stood in the well of the U.S. Senate and extolled the virtues of the fillibuster as the "secret weapon" of the minorities in the new Iraqi government. The video/audio links can be found over at "Swing State Project" if anyone wants to listen to or watch the clip.

By: JackLewis.net

JackLewis.net — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 15:37:28 +0000

Beware of Democrats offering to compromise
From MSNBC: In private talks with Majority Leader Bill Frist, the Senate's top Democrat has indicated a willingness to allow...

By: McGehee

McGehee — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 14:39:00 +0000

Barry, apparently your history books begin when Clinton took office, and leave out certain salient facts. Every single Clinton judicial nominee who was approved by the judiciary committee got an up-or-down floor vote. Not every nominee got approved by the committee. Some, it is true, didn't even get hearings -- because both of the nominee's home-state Senators objected. This practice is a holdover from Democrat control and cannot be blamed on the Republicans. In fact, if I remember correctly, the requirement that both home-state Senators object before a nominee be denied a hearing, was altered by Daschle in 2001 after Jeffords gave him back control of the Senate, so that it only took one home-state Senator to block a hearing. I seem to recall talk of a proposal, once Republicans regained control, to end the practice entirely, but I don't know what came of it. James?

By: Barry

Barry — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 14:10:18 +0000

"The âfilibusterâ isnât the enemyâ¦itâs the Leftist idea that Judicial nominees shouldnât be allowed to receive a legitimate up or down vote in the Senate. Thatâs the enemyâ¦not the filibuster."

I guess that your history books start with Bush's first inauguration, then. IIRC, about 60 of Clinton's nominees never got a legitimate up or down vote in the Senate.

By: DeWaun

DeWaun — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 13:18:44 +0000

This is absolutely a no-win deal for the future of conservatives or even "Republicans". This, in my opinion, is not the time to compromise, but to vanquish this enemey of the Constitutional process. The "filibuster" isn't the enemy...it's the Leftist idea that Judicial nominees shouldn't be allowed to receive a legitimate up or down vote in the Senate. That's the enemy...not the filibuster. A Republican compromise on this issue will mean some seriously large amounts of pissed off American conservatives. And there's a lot of us out there.