I confess to a certain disappointment, however. I admit that I was looking forward to hearing the cries of rage when the tactic ultimately backfired, as it was sure to do. Indeed, the whole filibuster crisis was triggered by the backfire of a previous shortsighted Republican tactic of using parliamentary maneuvering to block a large number of Clinton's judicial nominees from coming to a vote. Having established that such tactics (which would once have been viewed as an unacceptable violation of Senate etiquette) are fair game, the Republicans inevitably found themselves, after a shift in the political tides, looking down the barrel of their own tactic.

It is amazing, considering the razor-thin narrowness of the margins in the last two elections, that the Republicans would want to increase the ability of the chief executive to ram through controversial judicial appointees. I thought that the screams of the Democrats had a certain "No, no, don't throw us in that briar patch!" character. After all, appointment of extremist right-wing judges would only improve the Democrats' ability to argue in the next election that undecided voters should consider the harm done by now-unrestrained judicial appointments by a Republican president indebted to the religious right. And of course, if the Democrats did take the office, they could point out that it was a Republican rule that the President was using to put through his appointments.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_05/006350.php

So, yes, most politicians lie and are hypocrites, but what the Republicans have done here is qualitatively different from what the Democrats did under Clinton. The debate isn't really about the filibuster. It's about preventing a cynical attempt by the majority party to consolidate power. Even if for no reason other than self-interest, this is a bad move for the Republicans. What happens when they lose control of the Senate? I do not think so highly of the Democrats that, if the rules permitting the minority party to place a check on judicial nominations are not reinstated, they will not blithely abuse the system and ignore the preferences of the Republicans just as the latter are doing now. The nuclear option is not only unprecedented, unfair, and unwise, but it is unethical:

http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/_/2005/05/cheating_ii.php

Stable and fair rules are far more important than the moment's agenda, regardless of who is in power.

True, unless a significant number of swing voters regard the filibuster as a sacred tradition that should never be changed.

There do seem to be a few of these...

I didn't know this...

True, unless a significant number of swing voters regard the filibuster as a sacred tradition that should never be changed. Senators are accountable to the people, and voting to eliminate the filibuster is a bigger deal than voting to end debate on a specific issue.

See debate in the comments thread here.

Fortas was bipartisan, not a minority filibuster.

Clarify please, if you can

Posting at Outside the Beltway Steve Verden sheds some light on the current senate rules folderol by reminding us that:Of course, this is not in the least surprising since we are talking about politicians and we must always remember the primary law of ...