Tweety said Frist had the votes

so did Snow and Limbaugh today. I believe they may have been a vote or two short. What does everyone else think?

why did they compromise?

dg

getting rid of the filibuster would be a huge blow to the Senate, checks and balances in the Government, create a poisonous atmosphere, etc.

It would have been terrible damaging.

Frist, Bush, Rove, Dobson DON'T CARE. It is worth it to them to get their way.

that the Republican party and the Right Wing are on the ropes with the American People and there's a very good chance that in 2006 and 2008 the balance of power could shift and then they'd be out in the cold.

I don't think for a second that any of them besides McCain cared about upholding traditions of the Senate. I do believe however that they feared the retribution that would occur when the pendulum swung back our way.

Rp

he made a comment yesterday, think I've got it right...'the one question no-one could answer for me is still unanswered. What would happen to the Senate if the fillibuster is gone? No one could answer that to my satisfaction'.

There would have been a tremendous amount of pressure on any GOP Senator by the white house and Rove. Basically, these senators would be told that they would be dooming Bush to lame duck status early and endangering the GOP agenda.

Actually, that vote was probably Lindsay Graham. First he was for the nuclear option, then against it. It looks to me like it was Graham who turned it around.

:shrug:

never showed any leaning for the middle or moderate side of the spectrum. So the real question is what does he get out of this besides a big black mark on his political career? There is more than meets the eye with this compromise. What else is this little party of 14 going to demand from the senate?

edit to recognize my 500th post :woohoo:

. . . and one who deserves a leadership position a lot more than does Senator Frist.

For Graham, it has nothing to do with ideology. He wants the Senate to be able to take up its business, something for which Senator Frist does not seem to give two bits. The Democrats were ready to shut down the Senate if the nuclear option was invoked. So Senator Graham realized that pulling the trigger would have cost more than it was worth.

Of course, somebody could have sweetened the deal for him. But I don't know what they could have offered him in return for his support.

to find a compromise and that's why he worked his heart out to find one.

Nonetheless, he said on tv and on the floor of the Senate today that he and Mike DeWine were going to vote FOR the nuclear option if it came down to a vote.

That would have given Frist the votes. They would have won.

ideologue as any other in the gop. There have to be other bennies in this for him, he's not that altruistic to just be working for the high ideals of saving the revered Senate & country. It didn't bother him one whit to be ripping either one apart when he was salivating over nailing Clinton for a BJ!

:evilgrin:

and again on the floor of the senate today, that he and DeWine were both going to vote FOR the nuclear option if it came down to a vote.

This is from a piece for which there is a thread opened in Editorials and Other Articles:

One source of lingering political confusion over that "agreement" comes from the fact that no one knows exactly what "extraordinary circumstances" means. The written agreement reached by the 14 senators says that each signatory must use "his or her own discretion and judgment in determining whether such circumstances exist" . . . . Republicans who signed that agreement told Salon that they never discussed particular judges -- either current nominees or ones Bush might name in the future -- in trying to define what "extraordinary circumstances" means.

The definition is critical. If the Republicans who signed off on the agreement -- McCain, John Warner, Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins, Mike DeWine, Lincoln Chafee and Lindsey Graham -- believe that the Democratic signatories are filibustering future nominees who don't meet the "extraordinary circumstances" standard, they are free to push once again for the nuclear option. Frist warned that he'd be monitoring the agreement for "bad faith" and "bad behavior," and he made it clear that he'd be willing to push the Senate to the nuclear precipice once again if he saw signs of either.

Several of the Republicans who signed the deal echoed Frist's warnings.

the nuclear option if it came down to it.

Frist had the votes until Graham went the other way.

would have looked 100 times worse threatening the Nuke Option then not having the votes to prevent the fillibuster...would have looked pretty darn foolish then!:toast:

If the Reubs had Nuked the Dems would have had to go into aggresive counter measures which after the loss of of Filibuster would have only been strict adherance to protocols which would have brought Senate Business to a crawl and it could have gotten worse then that. The money hucksters on K-Street couldnot have survived that. THe trough would have dred up because no business would hae been moving forward which at the end of the day is about who gets what money afterall. THis is really the reason they backed down both sides. It really has nothing to do with judges.

right wing extemists running their party.

Two blowhard, sacks-a-shit...Actually, now that I think about it, let's perpetuate this theory, it'll give the fundy's caniptions!!!

McCain and his non-insane-RW faction merely peeled off enough people who preferred compromise to Armageddon.

But if push came to shove and the vote was forced, Frist would have prevailed, IMO.

DTH

wanted this result. Yeah, right!!!!!!!!

He's saying even after the compromise that Frist should have called for the Nuclear Option vote anyways... He would have been soundly beaten had he done it so I wish he had because it would be that final kick to the far right's nuts that they deserve.

Rp

I think we walked right into a trap

They know that public opinion is against them right now, but if they can play on people's misconceptions about the compromise they can be in a better situation to break it when we rightly filibuster extremist judges.

Some of those "Republican Moderates" whose praises are being sung all over DU right now will get on TV talk about how hard they tried to compromise and save comity in the Senate but those mean old Democrats still filibustered King George's nominees.

This will leave the GOP in a better position to go nuclear than they would have been today.

We were playing checkers, they're playing chess.

Our leadership should have seen right through this.

The deal makes the GOP dissenters look better in the eyes of mainstream Americans regardless of what the fundies think and that helps them in elections and in the media.

Rp

First time we legitimately filibuster, they'll declare that the Dems reneged on their part of the deal and declare it null and void.

I think his momentum is gone.

He may have had only 50 and Cheney was the tiebreaker, but I believe he had the votes. If not, why did Reid, Byrd, etc. agree to this lousy compromise to put Owen, Rogers and Pryor on the bench? Also, aside from Saad and Myers it sounds like the remaining nominees will get an up or down vote. I believe the moderate repubs wanted a deal at all costs to avoid voting for the nuclear option -- some dems wanted the deal so they would not have to vote against it. This is a typical senate compromise that accomplishes very little. We will have to fight this battle again -- mark my words.

that this battle still looms, just not today.

was that some of the Senators (some of the Repub Senators ) would rather have cut off their arms than make that vote FOR the Nuclear option.....If they had to vote they would have voted with Frist under party pressure but not having to vote at all was a much better option. Frist may have had the votes but they were held under duress and the mavericks didn't want it.

that they got the radicals on the bench they wanted and when the dems use the filibuster in this congress if bush is given the opportunity for a supreme court nominee, the repukes will say they (dems) broke their promise in the compromise and still will threaten and may use the "nuclear" cheat.

.

We needed 6 of the 7 moderates. DeWine and Graham were prepared to vote for the nuclear option (as they each said on tv last night and Graham again said on the floor of the senate today) even though they didn't want it and worked their hearts out to prevent the vote from being held. That left us with a max of 5, not enough for us to win, and left them with at least 51 votes. They would have won.

He would still have been saying "no deal" last night and the Senate would be glowing today.

No, he didn't have the votes. Maybe only off by one or two. But close only counts in horseshoes.

That swing voter was Warner. Our local paper is The Washington Post.

Warner was playing the Never Let Them Know What You Are Thinking Maneuver to the hilt. And that was the way to play this one.

Either he couldn't get the votes, or he had the votes and still lost, which would be even worse.

and hopefully any aspirations as a presidential candidate!:toast:

but that is just me

...the Democrats were winning the Image War. The polls proved it. The Republicans were looking more like spoiled petulant bullies DEMANDING everything. Frist was prancing around the Senate threatening nuclear options, Dobson on TV every night demanding a Theocracy. These people were scaring middle America hurting the Republican Party. The Democrats were winning this fight. Most polls showed 70% support for the Democratic position...the Republicans were TOO EXTREME. With the WAR going badly, support for the republicans at an ALL TIME LOW, and 70% AGAINST the Nuclear option...AND approaching the 2006 elections...the Republicans couldn't afford the RISK of the Nuclear Option. They had to find another way to get what they wanted.

Enter Joe Lieberman and the DLC who brokered a DEAL with the Republicans:
The Republicans still get EVERYTHING they wanted, but NOW look like the Moderate levelheaded Compromisers have taken over the Party leadership from those EXTREMISTS!!! Praise the Lord! Those EXTREMISTS were getting out of hand. Thank goodness the REAL Republicans put them in their place....just in time for 2006. The Republican Extremists still GET EVERYTHING they wanted, gave up NOTHING, but, thanks to Joe Lieberman and the DLC..they NOW get to look like good guys, the Great Compromisers willing to work with the Democrats for the GOOD of America. Thank God these guys are back in charge!!!...and this brilliant PR Coup cost them NOTHING.

Dobson and Frist needed to be humbled a little so the Republicans could keep the middle from bolting. The Dobson freaks and the Fristians aren't going anywhere. The fact that Dobson, Limbaugh, and the other freaks are whining isn't HURTING the Republican Party. It is helping the Republicans retain their moderates who were getting uneasy with the Freak Show....all in time for 2006.


OH, and Joe Lieberman and the DLC get a little something extra in their envelops this week from their owners who get 3 MORE fanatic Corporatist Judges on the Federal Bench...It's ALL good for those guys.

The only people who got fucked in this DEAL were Americans who Work for a Living....AGAIN!

Maybe if the compromise had never been formed, then they would've had the votes. But on the same token if that had been the case, we would've had the votes to keep the Senate shut down.