Saturday, April 30, 2005

Update

The Frist Filibuster continues, despite the rain and the drunks, and is now nearing 100 hours. As of yesterday afternoon, they had speakers signed up through Monday.

Is it irritating to think that taxpayers' money is going to politicians' salaries so they can stand up there and read fables? Sure.

But at the same time, the protection of the minority is important, ESPECIALLY with something like judicial nominees. If you can't get 60 votes saying that we've heard enough about this candidate, I'm sorry, there's something wrong with the candidate, if they are that partisan of a judge. The mark of a good judge is that when you read her opinion, you can't tell whether it was written by a "conservative" or a "liberal," to quote Sen. John Kerry quoting someone else. If a vote is breaking so strictly on partisan lines that you can't get 5 people from the other side of the aisle to even end the debate, this is not a judge I want on any bench.

Ideal situation: just require 60 votes to confirm. That's essentially what we have now, except without the deadweight loss of time, effort, and money that comes from a filibuster. I know there's this romantic notion of Jimmy Stewart up there for 23 hours or whatever as "Mr. Smith." But please. If it's not going to come to a vote, the person is not going to be confirmed. So just say you need 60 votes to confirm.

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