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Ted Cruz

7 (6.5%)

Rick Santorum

16 (14.8%)

Michelle Bachmann

13 (12%)

Chris Christie

23 (21.3%)

Rand Paul

49 (45.4%)

Total Members Voted: 107

[misko27]

Given the trouble that two houses of Congress give us, what would make more splitting of the same power better? They might waste it more efficiently?


Anyway, Senate Democrats are considering the "nuclear option", a 51 majority vote that would allow Democrats to re-write Senate rules to weaken the Filibuster. They haven't so far because A: It'd be really enraging, given it sets the precedent of changing Senate rules to be more simple majority driven rather then Compromise and B: They hope Republicans will cave on the bill to raise the debt ceiling,which is currently being Filibustered.


Boehner has stated Obama's new offer, talks after a budget push-through and debt ceiling raise, would be akin to "Unconditional surrender". Republican Unity is fraying as, unlike any time before now, there is no end-game; many are worried the end game is losing. Boehner has confided in fellow republicans he has a few cards up his sleeve, but as for the moment no one knows what those may be. Republican Leadership has stated Obama and the Democrats will eventually negotiate, although they may "redefine negotiate".


Also the new rightist argument that Oct 17th is not the day, Nov 1st is. The logic is very simple, the US does not default until it does not have enough money to pay its debts, and when the Government cannot borrow starting Oct17th they would have about 30 Billion cash on hand, possibly enough to make it the week.

[Nadaka]

The filibuster should never have been granted the titanic power it now has.

[smirk]

Also the new rightist argument that Oct 17th is not the day, Nov 1st is. The logic is very simple, the US does not default until it does not have enough money to pay its debts, and when the Government cannot borrow starting Oct17th they would have about 30 Billion cash on hand, possibly enough to make it the week.

Oi vey.
From the NYTimes, emphasis mine:

Mr. Lew, who wrote to Congress on Tuesday to say he had used his last “extraordinary measure” to manage federal accounts in ways to buy time, reiterated that the government would most likely have about $30 billion available on Oct. 17.

“And $30 billion is a lot of money, but when you think about the cash flow of the government of the United States, we have individual days when our negative or positive cash flow is $50 or $60 billion,” he said on CNN. “So $30 billion is not a responsible amount of cash to run the government on.”

[lue]

Given the trouble that two houses of Congress give us, what would make more splitting of the same power better? They might waste it more efficiently?

Well, I clearly haven't thought up the complex and nearly untenable web of responsibilities and procedure that would result, but I mainly stated that just so we don't have to decide what method of choosing representatives is the best. According to my count, the framers brought us halfway to that goal . I would hope said web would build some redundancy, so we don't suffer gridlock such as this just because one house decides to hold the gov't hostage. I'd have to spend an afternoon dedicated to this America+ system I've vaguely outlined before I can really say anything with authority.

Anyway, Senate Democrats are considering the "nuclear option", a 51 majority vote that would allow Democrats to re-write Senate rules to weaken the Filibuster. They haven't so far because A: It'd be really enraging, given it sets the precedent of changing Senate rules to be more simple majority driven rather then Compromise

Could you please elaborate on how simple majority and compromise are mutually exclusive? Maybe I'm seeing your point wrong, but the constitution only asks for a 2/3 vote on very specific kinds of votes, and a simple majority is all that's needed for the rest. The filibuster reforms are, as I understand, to return them to the way they used to work, namely you are required to stand at the floor and speak. The way it's currently set up allows any senator to simply say they want a filibuster, and suddenly you need 2/3 vote to pass something. If I'm remembering correctly, current rules allow you to do this anonymously to boot, meaning you don't have to answer for your action.

I can see how a 2/3 vote in this particular senatorial makeup forces compromise. But if a particular side gets a super-majority next elections, not even a filibuster forces compromise to occur. The only way to guarantee compromise via required yea votes is to set the requirement at or near 100%. I personally don't think yea vote requirements are an effective way to guarantee compromise, unless you made the rules specific to the two-party system (e.g. "A majority of the Senate, including a majority of the minority, is required to pass a bill" for example.)

[Max White]

Yea, the entire filibuster thing is pretty silly. Over here after one then went on for two days or something crazy they introduced rules on how long somebody was allowed to speak. In general if somebody needs to say that would take too long they write it up in an official document and just reference to sections of that as needed, allowing members to read (or not read) at their own leisure. So far it works pretty well...

[Bauglir]

Unfortunately, we're all such huge fans of Jimmy Stewart that we can't bear to change the rules so that he can't happen in real life, so the best we'll get is forcing a filibuster to require speaking in person.

[Max White]

America: Land of "We would but 'merica"

[smirk]

so the best we'll get is forcing a filibuster to require speaking in person.

I don't get why we ever stopped doing this and made the simple threat sufficient. Seems like common sense. "You wanna grind proceedings to a halt? Fine, but you're gonna put some goddamn effort into it."

[lue]

Unfortunately, we're all such huge fans of Jimmy Stewart that we can't bear to change the rules so that he can't happen in real life, so the best we'll get is forcing a filibuster to require speaking in person.

Back when the whole Wendy Davis filibuster in the Texas Congress was going on, I was impressed by how strict the rules for filibuster there were. From what I remember, it required things like never taking a break for any purpose, staying on-topic to what you're filibustering at all times, and not using the desk in front of you for support.* Except for that last one, I'd like to see those rules put on a reformed US Senate filibuster.

so the best we'll get is forcing a filibuster to require speaking in person.

I don't get why we ever stopped doing this and made the simple threat sufficient. Seems like common sense. "You wanna grind proceedings to a halt? Fine, but you're gonna put some goddamn effort into it."

Amen. I don't see how making the filibuster as difficult as it was originally is a "nuclear option" either.

*I so wanted to turn that list into a link to the TVTropes Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking page, but I resisted.

[misko27]

60/40, actually. The reasons for a not-completely Majority system is it places so much emphasis on having 51% of the vote, and then doing anything and everything. When neither party has breached Super-Majority status, they don't have the mandate to ignore the other side completely. In the House, where Majority is god, Democrats could not even pretend to pull the things Senate Republicans have, but on the other hand this means the House can and has passed whatever flavor-of-the-week madness gains the support of the REpublican leadership, essentially negating the 200 Democrats elected by the rest of the country.


 But the real damage would be It would become more like the house in tone: Harsh, angry, ignoring the other side. Ordinarily it takes a whopping 67 votes to change Senate rules, the nuclear option (which the Senate leadership threatened to do earlier this year when they were delaying Obama's appointees infinitely, using it to get a agreement on the table) is a emergency measure bypassing most rules, only requires 51,and is unprecedented. It would be a personal shot across the bow at Senate Republicans too, and diminishes the status of the Senate as the Upper, more civilized House. This is the theory anyway, but the facts are Senate Rdpublicans would go ballistic, and Reid in particular would prefer to avoid it. Know that id the Tea Party had taken over the Senate instead of the House, The last few years would have had them forced to compromise on their agenda or not pass anything at all. Filibusters used to be rare too, but they became a casualty of the Tea Party Extremists.

America: Land of "We would but 'merica"

That is certainly one way of putting it.

[mainiac]

I don't get why we ever stopped doing this and made the simple threat sufficient. Seems like common sense. "You wanna grind proceedings to a halt? Fine, but you're gonna put some goddamn effort into it."

Because there are a lot of other things that the Senate majority leader would rather due with his time then allow the minority party to get free publicity for days on end.  Passing laws takes time, a lot of time.  Passing laws that don't have huge flaws takes even more.

Consider an episode of Law and Order versus a real court case.  Law and Order shows a few days of dramatic proceedings.  Real court cases take months or even years of work if the issue is important enough and very little real drama beyond what the media sensationalizes.  Congressional legislation has a similar effect at play.  The media in it's asinine obsession with who's "winning" covers a tiny amount of what congress does and most people don't realize the amount of very dull work that goes into legislation.

The self aggrandizing delay tactics of the republicans just make this problem worse.  They throw up a bunch of stupid, selfish procedural hurdles that just waste more time whenever they can.  The result is that they are just making everybody's job harder.

Personally I say we just do away with the filibuster.  The country did fine for 100 years until it was created by what was essentially a clerical error.  We'll do fine again when it's eliminated.

[smirk]

I don't get why we ever stopped doing this and made the simple threat sufficient. Seems like common sense. "You wanna grind proceedings to a halt? Fine, but you're gonna put some goddamn effort into it."

Because there are a lot of other things that the Senate majority leader would rather due with his time then allow the minority party to get free publicity for days on end.  Passing laws takes time, a lot of time.  Passing laws that don't have huge flaws takes even more.

Makes sense, but it still seems like they could've resolved that some other way than by making the filibuster so effortless. Time limits or limited uses per party per year, or the like. Of course that's really just treating the symptom rather than the cause, I suppose.

[alway]

Also the new rightist argument that Oct 17th is not the day, Nov 1st is. The logic is very simple, the US does not default until it does not have enough money to pay its debts, and when the Government cannot borrow starting Oct17th they would have about 30 Billion cash on hand, possibly enough to make it the week.

Oi vey.
From the NYTimes, emphasis mine:

Mr. Lew, who wrote to Congress on Tuesday to say he had used his last “extraordinary measure” to manage federal accounts in ways to buy time, reiterated that the government would most likely have about $30 billion available on Oct. 17.

“And $30 billion is a lot of money, but when you think about the cash flow of the government of the United States, we have individual days when our negative or positive cash flow is $50 or $60 billion,” he said on CNN. “So $30 billion is not a responsible amount of cash to run the government on.”

More relevantly: http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/07/politics/debt-ceiling-debate/index.html?hpt=po_c2

"[C]redit markets could freeze, the value of the dollar could plummet, and U.S. interest rates could skyrocket, potentially resulting in a financial crisis and recession that could echo the events of 2008 or worse."

But many conservatives doubt that, too.
"We don't expect there to be chaos," Terry said.
Rep. Steve King of Iowa recently called the threat of default "false demagoguery."
"I don't think the credit of the United States is going to be collapsed. I think that all this talk about a default has been a lot of demagoguery, a lot of false demagoguery," he added.
According to a September CNN/ORC poll, a slight majority of Republicans -- 52% -- said it would be a good thing for the country if the debt ceiling is not lifted while only 18% of Democrats said so.

...

Republican Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma said the United States could meet its obligations without lifting the debt ceiling.
"I would dispel the rumor that is going around that you hear on every newscast that if we don't raise the debt ceiling we will default on our debt," Coburn said Monday on CBS' "This Morning." "We won't. We will continue to pay our interest. We'll continue to redeem bonds and we'll issue new bonds to replace those."
What Coburn doesn't mention is that the United States would have to choose to pay its interest over the billions of dollars of other obligations -- Medicare, Social Security, etc. -- for which the federal government is responsible.

Again, many of them want to go over the cliff. They're so drowned in their own anarcho-libertarian kool-aid that they are completely ignoring basically every economist's and actual expert's warnings.

Though I suspect the important bit will be this:

Wall Street could be the biggest indicator of who is right in this fight. Investors nervous over the political impasse in Washington pushed all three major U.S. stock indexes lower on Monday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average alone lost more than 130 points, or nearly 1 percent of its value.

The DOW was down another 1% today, and the NASDAQ down 2%. When it really starts crashing, and it will if no deal appears imminent within the next week, Republicans will have absolutely no choice in the matter. When all their middle-aged and elderly constituents suddenly lose $10k or $20k, $40k or more from their retirement funds, and when their corporate sponsors see their invested wealth and businesses start to tank, there will be hell to pay for these shenanigans.

[Helgoland]

So there's a silver lining after all: If the Republicans start generally being seen as madmen, the Democrats will get all that juicy corporate monies!

[Max White]

Somehow I'm not convinces it actually works like that... Companies pay people who will do good things for their bottom line, not the sane...