Anyone want to talk about the pros and cons of the U.S. Senate and/or its filibuster rule? I am interested in what people think the Senate has meant historically, but also what eliminating the filibuster would mean for the Senate in the future.
The floor is yours.
The American Consensus on governing that has been tacit since WWII, is dead as a doornail. I’m afraid that at best we’re gonna be whipsawed between Republican/Democratic programs that pass and repeal each other as power passes between the two. (If business is intimidated by uncertainty, they better get used to it.) Republicans are gonna kill the filibuster the minute they need to. Dems would be wise to do the same and let the Republicans scream. It’s gonna be real ugly out there for the forseeable future. If there is one.
(If business is intimidated by uncertainty, they better get used to it.) …
You know that’s media propegated horse manure, right? Don’t you remember what you were taught in your youth? The only two certain things were death and taxes.
Uh, yes, that was snark.
Actually, as a former senior executive in a (European headquartered) global business I can attest that business does hate uncertainty as it plays havoc with budgets and forward planning. The road construction and windfarm industries – to name but two – have been almost destroyed by the on-off nature of the availability of funds and feed in tarifs. Businesses in general are not going to invest as much in new capacity/innovation if the outlook is very uncertain.
All of which is why the GOP scorched earth policy of recent years has been so devastating to growth potential in general. Ideally Businesses would like a five year horizon on future costs – Government capital investment budgets, revenue budgets, inflation, interest rates, currency rates etc. and a stable regulatory/policy environment.
In my experience (especially large) businesses will tolerate a higher tax/cost environment and tighter regulation more readily than a very unstable one where no one knows what the rules will be next year. That is why countries like Singapore do so well despite very high costs. The regulatory/policy/cost environment is very predictable and stable and why third world countries countries do so badly despite incredibly cheap costs.
The USA is increasingly resembling a third world country in the instability of its environment and thus will grossly under-perform its economic potential for the foreseeable future. Any country which regards 5 year plans as SOCIALISM doesn’t understand how mature big businesses actually operate. It’s all about regulatory stability/predictability and being able to plan with with a reasonable degree of accuracy.
I agree, the best climate is as you say. But the Chamber of Commerce types built this monster. The uncertainty is all of their own making and only they, probably, can undo it. Maybe.
But even sober businessmen are sitting out the election and letting the drunken mega-rich call the tune.
Are they hoping to live on exports?
As far as wind/solar, smart pension aggregates should get out of the casino market via hedge funds and invest in these utility projects for steady, inflation-proof income, as the wise European have discovered. Let the Wall Street sharks eat one another. They will soon scream if their volume falls to that of the 70’s.
Slight correction to:
The only legislation that passes anymore is that supported by and/or crafted within GOP rank-tanks. Both sides threaten to repeal such legislation whenever it will advantage them with the voting public, but neither actually repeals anything their 1% constituents, the MIC, and corporations are cool with.
Well, I think Wisconsin Dems have a few things they intend to repeal. It’s not just federal laws, it’s state and even local laws going off the rails.
Key word “intend” — when?
I don’t want to get rid of the fillibuster. I don’t even particularly want to change the 60 vote rule. I want TO MAKE THEM FILIBUSTER!!!
If the SOB’s really believe enough to speak for 14 hours straight — more power to them. If they have to hold up the work of the gov’t for 3 weeks while they read the phone book (I know, I know, urban legend … but it OUGHT to be true) — GOOD. Let their constituents see what is really going on.
The R’s will no longer have the sheild of the non-talking filibuster to hide behind. I think you’d find the filibuster go back to just about nothing.
No politician REALLY wants to be held accountable for his/her actions. Not even if they think its a good thing.
Hello. We’re talking Republicans here. You think whoever holds the Senate will respect the other’s changes?
And your point is?
I don’t give a rat’s ass what the R’s THINK about the changes. The Senate operating rules can be changed by a simple majority vote on the start of the first session of the congress. No filibuster is allowed on operating rules of regulation changes.
Yes!
Aired on C-Span Six — funded by the Senate (through cuts to perks they currently enjoy at public expense) and a user fee to those that call the filibuster.
Under normal conditions I’d go along with the argument that changing Senate rules by simple majority vote every time the chamber changes hands is a slippery slope to a crocodile pit.
But the GOP isn’t a normal political party anymore, and it’s unclear if they’re going to recover any semblance of normalcy within the next 10-20 years. As long as that’s true, what is clear is that they will switch the rules fo their own benefit as soon as they have the power to do so, and the need.
They’ve threatened to do it before over judicial appointments, and that not even by following normal Senate procedure, but by changing the rules mid-session. There is no reason to think they’d do any otherwise should they regain control of the Senate in the foreseeable future. If anything, they’ve only grown more belligerent and reckless since losing power.
What I’d like to see? Either a rules change requiring real filibusters as DerFarm advocates above, or adopting some of the more recent models proposed (by whom, I don’t remember off the top) that would still allow filibustering and holds up to a point, in order to slow down an overhasty vote on legislation that needs further study and debate, but that would ultimately, some months down the road, still allow for an up or down vote.
But that ain’t gonna happen with today’s GOP. It’s not a question of whether the filibuster rules get changed, it’s a question of who does it first.
At the very least, we need to allow for presidential appointments to go through. There is no possible justification for President Obama to have gone through an entire term of office–which he will do, eventually–with so many outstanding appointments still pending approval due to such an easily abused system of procedure.
This question is a small part of a larger conversation we need to be having about all the points in the Constitutional system at which the rights of all the people are not being served.
And we also need to deal with some extra-Constitutional (not necessarily unconstitutional) end runs that have been made by coordinated actions of the states. The obvious first example here is corporate personhood, on which a lot of the other excesses rest.
As a matter of principle, and not necessarily of strategy, the Senate should end the filibuster and review a lot of the other arcane rules that advantage long-term incumbents is serving those who they serve (even when it isn’t their constituents). The prerogatives of a committee chair is an example of another area of arcane rules.
I understand fully that a lot of these rules were created to prevent debates from turning violent over contentious issues. And that they originally were tokens in negotiating deals, not total showstoppers of all government action.
I don’t know when it will happen but it sure would be helpful if voters could watch dealmaking on legitimate interests without punishing legislators for not being pure enough. It could bring the process out into the sunshine instead of hiding the conflict behind closed doors, opening up the negotiations to the influence of lobbyists. And also moderating the politicians’ temptation to grandstand when there are activities visible to the public.
Eliminating the filibuster would make the Senate operate like the House and like a lot of state senates. But the House has its own arcane procedures like the “suspend the rules” vote that requires a supermajority.
And the rulesmaking process itself is subject to the same sorts of jury-rigging as any other aspect of the legislative process.
As a strategic matter if Democrats win the Senate, they should end the filibuster and slam legislation that helps the people through. For Democrats, the danger is in the identification of “legislation that helps the people”. And exactly which people they are helping. A first good-faith signal would be to eliminate some of the perqs that members of Congress enjoy that Republicans and some Democrats would deny to ordinary citizens.
I agree with much of what you said, but in the House don’t you think if they are going to suspend the rules of the House it should require a super-majority?
I’d very much like to see the 60 vote standard survive for lifetime judicial appointments. When the Republicans were trying to nuclear option out the filibuster before, that was a disaster for our country.
Because Republican judicial nominees are pretty much full blown fascists at this point.
There is unlikely to be any permanent Democratic majority in the senate. And even though the generic Democrat will be the favorite for president in every election for the next political generation, losing some qualified liberal judges over filibuster bullshit is worth keeping that safeguard against the ravages of the Federalist Society if the Republicans should accidentally find themselves back in power.
I don’t see why it’s necessary to completely eliminate the filibuster. Just change the rules to make it harder to pull off, like it used to be.