6. No, they were going to seek a constitutional ruling that the fillibuster did not apply to
judicial nominations. They argued that such a ruling only required 50 votes to pass, though they never actually tried it. No one doubts that the fillibuster applies to this legislation, barring the use of the budget reconciliation process.
The Republicans, when they had a bare majority, threatened the Senate with the "nuclear" option to do away with the filibuster altogether. Maybe it's time we started yammering on about the will of the people and those sacrosanct up-or-down votes. That sure seemed to play well a few years ago. I wonder why it's now out of fashion to talk that way?
...it was the ability to filibuster Senate confirmations. If they had done "the nuclear option" then Dems would still be able to filibuster legislation but not, say, Supreme Court nominees.
7. You see no harm to it - ARE YOU FRICKING NUTS???!!!
Republicans had 55 senators during the Bush administration. Can you imagine what our courts would look like if Bush didn't have to worry about some of this worse picks had a free pass to get on a judicial bench.
Leave it at 60. Because politicals is like the tide - it goes high and low on a regular basis. And the last thing we want is it going low when we're stuck with an idiot in the White House.
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