Nancy Pelosi has made it clear -- no bipartisan infrastructure bill without the reconciliation bill. I wish she would go one step further. No infrastructure at all without voting rights. Sadly, that would probably be a step too far. I suspect that the deal is already made between Joe Biden and Joe Manchin. The bipartisan infrastructure bill will pass as will reconciliation. We may be giving up what's left of our democracy.
Color me disgusted! The color of my disgust is red; anger at Biden and Garland. There will be no agreement on an infrastructure bill because the Republicans are stringing the Dems along to run out the clock. Then they can say that at least they tried to work with the Dems, "but you saw what those Democrats did, right?" What is wrong with Biden and Schumer when they don't take McConnell at his word when he promised to ensure no bills pass that will make Biden look good? As for Garland, like Biden, he lives by standards that no longer exist. Yes, please color me disgusted!!!
Basically, too many Democrats, including Biden, seem to believe we are still in an era when it makes sense to express deference to one's fellow Senators and act all civil to one another. I don't think there is yet--somehow--an appreciation that this is essentially a fight to the death...of democracy. This is existential, folks. Garland is so far out to lunch that I think it should be embarassing for Democrats to support him at this point.
On the talking filibuster: As someone who is old enough to remember when aides brought cots to the corridor outside the Senate, so that senators could rest and yet answer middle-of-the-night quorum calls that could have sunk the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, I think that you've got it a bit wrong. The way the talking filibuster worked was that one senator would get up and start talking. At some point he--there were only one or two women in the body then--would yield for a question. The question might go on for hours. And then the questioner might yield. Eventually, I suppose, the first senator would have to orate for a few more house. In that way, the filibuster would go on for day after day, while the objectors hoped that the majority would simply decide that the Senate could not afford to spend all of its time on the matter at hand. For a wonderful dramatization of the old filibuster, see the second season of The West Wing, where one senator ties up the budget.
Nancy Pelosi has made it clear -- no bipartisan infrastructure bill without the reconciliation bill. I wish she would go one step further. No infrastructure at all without voting rights. Sadly, that would probably be a step too far. I suspect that the deal is already made between Joe Biden and Joe Manchin. The bipartisan infrastructure bill will pass as will reconciliation. We may be giving up what's left of our democracy.
A agree with you that Merrick Garland 'misunderstands the moment in which he and American find themselves' and I hope we are proven wrong.
“ . . .what the American people want is justice, not “catharsis.” I like that, very much!
Color me disgusted! The color of my disgust is red; anger at Biden and Garland. There will be no agreement on an infrastructure bill because the Republicans are stringing the Dems along to run out the clock. Then they can say that at least they tried to work with the Dems, "but you saw what those Democrats did, right?" What is wrong with Biden and Schumer when they don't take McConnell at his word when he promised to ensure no bills pass that will make Biden look good? As for Garland, like Biden, he lives by standards that no longer exist. Yes, please color me disgusted!!!
Basically, too many Democrats, including Biden, seem to believe we are still in an era when it makes sense to express deference to one's fellow Senators and act all civil to one another. I don't think there is yet--somehow--an appreciation that this is essentially a fight to the death...of democracy. This is existential, folks. Garland is so far out to lunch that I think it should be embarassing for Democrats to support him at this point.
On the talking filibuster: As someone who is old enough to remember when aides brought cots to the corridor outside the Senate, so that senators could rest and yet answer middle-of-the-night quorum calls that could have sunk the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, I think that you've got it a bit wrong. The way the talking filibuster worked was that one senator would get up and start talking. At some point he--there were only one or two women in the body then--would yield for a question. The question might go on for hours. And then the questioner might yield. Eventually, I suppose, the first senator would have to orate for a few more house. In that way, the filibuster would go on for day after day, while the objectors hoped that the majority would simply decide that the Senate could not afford to spend all of its time on the matter at hand. For a wonderful dramatization of the old filibuster, see the second season of The West Wing, where one senator ties up the budget.