Once More Into The Breach
The Dems actually showed up for the Judiciary Committee meeting?
That tells me they're confident the Republicans won't try for the Byrd option, or will lose on the vote if they do.
There appears to be not a single Senate Republican, (e.g. Rick Santorum) who understands the big picture:
1) They had the public entirely behind them on breaking the filibuster at the start of the session three months ago;
2) Thinking that they'd already won the PR battle on that issue on Election Day, they abandoned making the case for ending judicial filibusters;
3) The Democrats didn't stop making the case for upholding them, and have kept it up ever since;
4) Guess what? Now polls are showing the public has switched to the Dem view on the matter, even as they continue to say that, in principle, every nominee should get an up-or-down vote. And in response, no less a once-stalwart conservative than Rick Santorum is recommending that the craven dithering that has gotten his caucus into this predicament be extended indefinitely.
So what should the GOP do? Activate the Byrd option anyway.
Polls are transitory, and the next election is eighteen months away. There's plenty of time to turn them back in our favor, especially after pushing through the rule change.
Best recent historical example: the Clinton impeachment. The other side spun the 1998 midterm elections as a repudiation of the GOP on impeachment, even though Republican candidates across the country had fled in terror from the issue. Then House 'Pubbies did a funny thing: they pressed ahead and passed the two articles anyway. The Senate didn't convict, as nobody thought they would, but the point was made nevertheless. Democrats vowed that the GOP would pay dearly in the next (2000) election.
If I remember correctly, one House "prosecutor" was defeated for re-election - whereas the GOP lost four seats on the Senate side. And, of course, we took back the White House.
Activating the Byrd option now won't hurt Republican chances in the '06 midterms any more than the Terri Schiavo affair. A year and a half is a loooooong time in politics.
But failing to break the filibuster, or even to try, will doom them immediately, because the jilted base won't forget.
One thing's for sure: Bill Frist will never make anybody forget Henry V:
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.
In peace there's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility:
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger;
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage;
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;
Let pry through the portage of the head
Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it
As fearfully as doth a galled rock
O'erhang and jutty his confounded base,
Swill'd with the wild and wasteful ocean.
Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,
Hold hard the breath and bend up every spirit
To his full height.On, on, you noblest English.
Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof!
Fathers that, like so many Alexanders,
Have in these parts from morn till even fought
And sheathed their swords for lack of argument:
Dishonour not your mothers; now attest
That those whom you call'd fathers did beget you.
Be copy now to men of grosser blood,
And teach them how to war.
And you, good yeoman,
Whose limbs were made in England, show us here
The mettle of your pasture; let us swear
That you are worth your breeding; which I doubt not;
For there is none of you so mean and base,
That hath not noble lustre in your eyes.
I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start.
The game's afoot:
Follow your spirit, and upon this charge
Cry 'God for Harry, England, and Saint George!'
Would somebody please tell Fristy that the Harry here isn't surnamed "Reid"?
posted by JASmius at 11:14 PM
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