what has been the consequence of the "just say no" republicans in the first year of the obama admin? have the dems used their fillibuster-proof majority to good effect, or has the country sided largely w/ the knights who say nay?
It works when it needs to... Too bad Ike was a chicken****. A little more backbone, initiative and principle on social policies and the sixties would have never happened. No hippies, no Panthers, none of it.
Here's a nonsense example... http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/01/dems-break-gop-filibuster_n_445242.html In his State of the Union address last week, President Obama issued the GOP a challenge. "If the Republican leadership is going to insist that 60 votes in the Senate are required to do any business at all in this town--a super-majority--then the responsibility to govern is now yours as well," he said. "Just saying no to everything may be good short-term politics, but it's not leadership." Senate Republicans answered on Monday: They'll stick with the short-term politics, thank you. In a particularly pugnacious move, the GOP insisted Monday evening on 60-vote threshold for a fairly middle-of-the-road nominee to be solicitor general at the Department of Labor. To be sure, Patricia Smith, the New York State Labor Commissioner, wouldn't be nominated by a Republican president and has the support of the AFL-CIO. But she also has the backing of New York business groups and local Chambers of Commerce, as well as GOP members of the New York House delegation. Still, for Senate Republicans, she might as well have been Karl Marx and Van Jones wrapped into one. Every Republican who showed up voted to sustain a filibuster against her nomination. As a result, it took every member of the Democratic caucus to end the filibuster, on a 60-32 vote. In a normal legislative body, a 2-1 vote is a rout. In today's Senate, it's a squeaker. And when Scott Brown takes his newly-won Senate seat, the GOP will have the votes it needs to block nominees like Patricia Smith. "They're going to have to decide what they're going to do. Brown will be here shortly and they'll hold the [power] on whether or not we have people in place to make the country work," said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.).
Motions to cloture and clotures themselves waste a lot of limited time. I guess if you do enough of them it's like a real fillibuster.
I believe they are now the same. Maybe 20 years ago or so, they changed the rules to eliminate the old-style filibuster of having to constantly speak. Now you just say you want to filibuster and it's done - that's basically the cloture vote.
It's really easy to get a lot of people behind you when you lie about everything and the "liberal" media, rather than calling you on it, gives you equal/greater air time.
I meant more along the lines of your tea bagger friends that were holding marches protesting the Obama tax raises (after he lowered their taxes). Of course, you knew that.
and during the bush years it was the republicans who constantly whined about the democrats playing politics and holding up the voting process ("just give us an up or down vote"), but now that the roles are reversed they are doing the exact same crap. and their new-found love of fiscal conservatism, after supporting bush for 8 years is the height of hypocrisy. i dont believe any of the bush supporters are sincere when it comes to fiscal conservatism and limited government - they loved it when it was their guy and if you criticized bush for it they even called you unamerican and a terrorist supporter. remember in 05 or so when the democrats wanted to hold a hearing of their own it was the republicans literally stuffing them in a broomcloset and shutting the lights out on them while they were still in meeting? i havent seen democrats treating the republicans like they were treated for 8 years. republicans spent 8 years shutting the democrats out of the political process and now that they are in the minority they are whining more than the democrats ever did, and the democrats arent even engaging in the same kind of cutthroat politics that the republicans did for all that time. EDIT: but in the end its the democrats own fault - they are p*****s. it may be too late, but hopefully we see more of this obama that we saw a few days ago, when he gave the republicans a swift beat-down. to me, his tough guy routine seems a little late...especially regarding the banks - he only gets tough after he gives away trillions (just like bush did, i might add).
Don't require him to take a position when he clearly is afraid to; you're just going to get ignored, or he will post a nonresponsive youtube video that nobody will watch.
please, obama supported it all the way and called for its continuation when he took office - and like i said, his recent tough talk rings hollow in light of the fact that the banks already got theirs - where was this kind of rhetoric when they were giving away trillions last year?
of course he supported, like 73 other senators who had the country's well being on their mind. I mean you act like the congress was happy to give that money away, the rhetoric was there last year.
you might want to check your math, most of that money has been (or is projected to be) repaid and the shortfall is going to be nowhere near "trillions" (actually the program itself was less than $1trillion - so giving away trillions is just flat wrong). The net cost is likely going to be in the $100b range, and the bank tax is proposed to rectify that. Now precisely tell me what your objection is? What is ringing hollow?
and you act like obama is just along for the ride when as president he is the one pushing for it. im against corporate bailouts, especially for corporations whose own malfeasance and greed got them in the position they were in. obama was not, and my point again is that his recent tough talk rings hollow in light of his previous actions.
