It's Pronounced Nuuuuuu-CU-LAR

Harry Reid finally did the right thing. And this is big fucking deal. Eliminating the filibuster for nominations is key because it's not some deal that solves the problem for this specific set. He's changed how the senate will govern, probably forever.

I've had several like minded friends express concern to me that if we eliminate the filibuster Republicans will be able to force through really awful stuff once they regain power. Let me quickly explain why this was the right move:

1) If the Republicans regain the Senate (and have a Republican president and house), they would have used the nuclear option on the first day of the session, for legislation, for supreme court nominees, for absolutely everything. Trust me on this. Only Democrats get ask questions about whether or not they should use power the power they have. And if the Republicans didn't, they actually have a base that will boot them out of office for fucking up.

2) The Republicans have been able to get 40 of their members to walk in lockstep on every major bill/nominee they've wanted to kill. There is a 0.0% chance the Democrats would do the same. The corporate dems, the gangs of gangs, the ones who don't have any reason to fear enraging their liberal base (spoiler: all of them). But what if they nominated a Supreme Court justice as horrible as Scalia or Alito? Exactly.

The Republicans would waited 5 minutes to make this change not 5 years, and even if they hadn't it's not like the Democrats would have put up a fight. And besides, it's making an undemocratic institution slightly more democratic, which is always a good thing.

This is major progress towards giving us a functional government. Not just because filling the courts with these nominees is important (it is), but because the senate is governed by made up undemocratic rules, and the sooner you start changing them, and the sooner staffers and DC journalists stop getting the vapors any time it's mentioned... you get steps closer and closer to the real thing, eliminating the filibuster (and the Senate entirely, but I'll take this for the moment). Proving things like this can be done is critical breaking down these imaginary barriers that have been used so long in institutions like the senate to shield corruption and disgusting lawmaking. It took far to long to get here, but I'm glad we've taken this step forward.

What Do You Want On Your Tombstone?

(From Mitch McConnell's twitter account. No, really.)

For the millionth time, some sort of filibuster reform seems like it has legs. We've let down in the past (and will probably be let down again), but I can't help but get excited about anything that might make the senate less terrible:

Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) launched a barn-burner of a speech Thursday on the Senate floor, excoriating Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) for continued obstruction when it comes to presidential nominees. He escalated the battle by setting up test votes next week on a series of potentially controversial nominees.

“Senator McConnell broke his word,” Reid said. “The Republican leader has failed to live up to his commitments. He’s failed to do what he said he would do — move nominations by regular order except in extraordinary circumstances. I refuse to unilaterally surrender my right to respond to this breach of faith.”

The remarks were Reid’s first in weeks on the issue of nominations and Senate gridlock, a brewing fight that he sidelined last month in order to pass immigration reform through the Senate. McConnell has been regularly arguing for weeks that Reid is breaking his word by threatening to change the rules with the nuclear option after he agreed not to upon passage of the modest rules changes in January which preserved the filibuster.

. . .

Pending nominations that could play a role in the filibuster fight include three to run the Labor Department (Tom Perez), Environmental Protection Agency (Gina McCarthy) and CFPB (Cordray); several nominees to serve on the National Labor Relations Board, and three picks to fill vacancies on the powerful D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.
“I’m going to start the process today,” he said Thursday. “We’re going to file cloture on a bunch of nominations. And those votes will occur next week.”

McConnell, clearly worked up over Reid’s speech, responded on the floor shortly after and vowed that Democrats will “live to regret it” if they follow through with the threat to change the rules of the Senate with a bare majority of votes. He called the accusations of obstruction an “absolutely phony, manufactured crisis,” and conceded that McCarthy and Perez “already have enough votes to clear a 60-vote hurdle.”

“Senate Democrats are getting ready to do permanent damage to this body,” McConnell warned, and made a morbid reference regarding Reid. “No majority leader wants written on his tombstone that he presided over the end of the Senate.”

Mitch McConnell could not be more wrong. There is no greater accomplishment anyone could ask for on their tombstone than having ended the Senate.

Max Baucus is a Corrupt Sack of Shit

Well done to the New York Times for going to great lengths to point this out:

WASHINGTON — Restaurant chains like McDonald’s want to keep their lucrative tax credit for hiring veterans. Altria, the tobacco giant, wants to cut the corporate tax rate. And Sapphire Energy, a small alternative energy company, is determined to protect a tax incentive it believes could turn algae into a popular motor fuel.

To make their case as Congress prepares to debate a rewrite of the nation’s tax code, this diverse set of businesses has at least one strategy in common: they have retained firms that employ lobbyists who are former aides to Max Baucus, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, which will have a crucial role in shaping any legislation.

No other lawmaker on Capitol Hill has such a sizable constellation of former aides working as tax lobbyists, representing blue-chip clients that include telecommunications businesses, oil companies, retailers and financial firms, according to an analysis by LegiStorm, an online database that tracks Congressional staff members and lobbying. At least 28 aides who have worked for Mr. Baucus, Democrat of Montana, since he became the committee chairman in 2001 have lobbied on tax issues during the Obama administration — more than any other current member of Congress, according to the analysis of lobbying filings performed for The New York Times.

“K Street is literally littered with former Baucus staffers,” said Jade West, an executive at a wholesalers’ trade association that relies on a former finance panel aide, Mary Burke Baker. “It opens doors that allow you to make the case.”

Like Ms. Baker, many of those lobbyists have already saved their clients millions — in some cases, billions — of dollars after Mr. Baucus backed their requests to extend certain corporate tax perks, provisions that were adopted as part of the so-called fiscal cliff legislation in January. Baucus aides who later became lobbyists helped financial firms save $11.2 billion in tax deferments and helped secure a $222 million tax benefit that is shared with the liquor industry.

Those who remember the Healthcare bill remember that Max Baucus carried the water for the insurance industry (and the Obama Administration) in making the bill much, much worse. Only Baucus didn't always oppose elements of the house bill, he's simply so corrupt he can't help himself. When discussions about healthcare began, Baucus released a white paper that included a public option, and other improvements on the bill. That was until the health insurance industry dumped over 2 million dollars into his campaign, making him suddenly have a change of heart over these reforms. Rahm Emanuel then used him to craft the White House's preferred bill with no public option (among other things), and that was basically the bill that ended up becoming law.

Ahhh memories.

Max Baucus is the worst. He also represents a state with a million people, yet has the same power as representatives of states with 30 million. Probably more, based on his committee position. Abolish the Senate, if for no other reason than it breeds and empowers the Max Baucuses of the world.

Abolish the Senate

Crappily recreated from this amazing New York Times graphic.

These Senators represent 1/4th of the population:

These Senators represent the same number of people:

Abolishing the Senate is the greatest reform we can take, and it should be a long term goal of the progressive  movement.

Filibuster Fight Puts Dem Kabuki out in the Open

The filibuster wasn't changed because many senate Democrats don't want to change it. It's that simple.

Here's the tell::

Senate Democrats have the 51 votes necessary to weaken the filibuster, the top two Democrats declared unequivocally on Wednesday.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) said he’s continuing discussions with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) over a bipartisan resolution. But when asked if he has the 51 votes for filibuster reform via the constitutional option if that fails, he didn’t mince words.

“Yes,” Reid said.

Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL) told reporters that the Merkley-Udall “full talking filibuster” approach likely won’t happen because it “does not have 51 votes.” But he said a more modest package that Reid has put forth to McConnell, aimed at shifting the burden from a governing majority to an obstructing minority, would pass.

Breaking this down, both Reid and Durbin agree that they have 51 votes for a package that would weaken the filibuster. They don't have votes for Merkley-Udall, which is disappointing but not too surprising. As long as we get some reforms that are passed with simple 51 vote majority, that would be helpful for governing in the short term and important in changing norms for the rules in the long term. And let's state this once again for the record: they have the votes to take this option.

Fast forward to today (writing this before Wednesday night, so if they don't do a deal, forgive me), but so if, where they predictably "cave "and strike a worse deal with Mitch McConnell, it's because they don't want to actually change the filibuster. This is one of those moments where Kabuki dance is put right out in the open for the world to see. In the fiscal cliff negotiations, it was obvious that Obama didn't want all of the taxes on rich people to expire (including estate and carried interest), because he agreed to a deal that was much worse than what he would have gotten had he done nothing and rates went up on their own. It wasn't that he was a bad negotiator, he got the deal he wanted. There is no other explanation.

The same principle applies here. If you have 51 votes to do stronger reforms, and you agree to weaker ones, it means you didn't want to do the stronger reforms in the first place. That's exactly what happened here. Senators use made up rules like the filibuster to cover for the fact that quite a few of them don't give the slightest shit about actually trying to pass good public policy that risks offending their corporate masters. They would rather campaign and grandstand about popular policies and then whine about endless obstruction when in fact it's providing them an excuse to kill something they never wanted to do anyway.

If the Senate wants to do something (particularly it's leadership, they will make that shit happen. Harry Reid used the freaking NUCLEAR OPTION in 2011 when Turtle man was trying to embarrass the Democratic caucus into voting for a bill that was never going to pass. Notice he didn't do that for the public option, or stronger elements in Dodd-Frank, or any of the other millions of things Republicans have "stopped" with filibuster. Republican obstruction is actually a very useful tool for Democrats who don't give a shit about passing progressive legislation, which, unfortunately is a large portion of the caucus. They want the filibuster because it gives them the ability to campaign on progressive (and popular) policies that keep them in good standing with their base while actually doing nothing or watering down legislation to please the corporate interests that really pay for their campaigns. That's the game, plain and simple.

Harry Reid and Barack Obama make plenty of mistakes, but they aren't as dumb, naive and incompetent as these negotiations make them seem. They're getting what they want, we're just not playing the same game.