Lieberman and 60 Hotlist
by Kagro X
from DailyKos
Fri Nov 14, 2008
Just a few points I want to make regarding Joe Lieberman, the Myth of 60, and the filibuster. Conveniently, DemFromCT's pundit roundup informs me that Joe Conason has already made the political points well for me today:
Conason makes the point politically. There are several Republicans facing potentially tough reelection battles in 2010, and that tends to make some of them reticent about obstructionism. Not always, and not on every single vote. But the peculiar nature of cloture votes is such that party affiliation isn't always the most dependable predictor of how things will come out.
In looking over the cloture votes in the 110th Congress, it quickly becomes obvious that aisle-crossing votes aren't even something you can easily quantify, because a significant number of them don't break down along anything approaching strict partisan lines. Sometimes the ideological lines are clear, but partisan lines much less so. A typical cloture vote may well see 10-15 Democrats, or even nearly half the caucus on one side, with the rest on the other. Republicans, too, split their conference with fair frequency. In fact, of the 110 cloture votes in the last Congress, only three saw no crossover voting whatsoever. And in one of those instances, some 19 Senators didn't even vote, so it's hard to pin down its analytical value. Even so, three out of 110 votes is a rarity no matter how you look at it. Over 97% of the time there were Senators straying from the position taken by the majority of their side of the aisle, not including Lieberman or Harry Reid, who as Majority Leader will often switch his vote at the last minute to the other side -- a procedural move that gives him the right to call the vote up for reconsideration at a later date.
(More here.)
from DailyKos
Fri Nov 14, 2008
Just a few points I want to make regarding Joe Lieberman, the Myth of 60, and the filibuster. Conveniently, DemFromCT's pundit roundup informs me that Joe Conason has already made the political points well for me today:
Let’s count the actual votes on the Republican side of the aisle, asking which Senators would have both the inclination and the will to join a filibuster. Every issue calls forth different levels of resistance, of course, but in each instance the opposition would need at least 41 total. In the very worst case, should the Republicans pick up all the remaining seats, they will begin with three more than that.Again, the thing to keep in mind about filibusters and cloture votes is that it's not how many seats your caucus occupies, it's how many votes you can muster. To paraphrase a recent popular refrain, seats don't vote.
Six Senate Republicans will face reelection two years hence in states that went for Mr. Obama: Judd Gregg (R-NH), Arlen Specter (R- PA), George Voinovich (R-OH), Mel Martinez (R-FL), Chuck Grassley (R- IA), and Richard Burr (R-NC). Having seen their fellow incumbents fall in the last two elections, that half dozen may well consider themselves in varying degrees of political peril. Poor Mr. Gregg watched his New Hampshire colleague John Sununu drop this year as their state turned deep blue. Mr. Martinez won his seat in 2004 by a single point and is widely considered vulnerable. So are Mr. Specter, nearing his 80th birthday, and Mr. Voinovich, now 72.
Conason makes the point politically. There are several Republicans facing potentially tough reelection battles in 2010, and that tends to make some of them reticent about obstructionism. Not always, and not on every single vote. But the peculiar nature of cloture votes is such that party affiliation isn't always the most dependable predictor of how things will come out.
In looking over the cloture votes in the 110th Congress, it quickly becomes obvious that aisle-crossing votes aren't even something you can easily quantify, because a significant number of them don't break down along anything approaching strict partisan lines. Sometimes the ideological lines are clear, but partisan lines much less so. A typical cloture vote may well see 10-15 Democrats, or even nearly half the caucus on one side, with the rest on the other. Republicans, too, split their conference with fair frequency. In fact, of the 110 cloture votes in the last Congress, only three saw no crossover voting whatsoever. And in one of those instances, some 19 Senators didn't even vote, so it's hard to pin down its analytical value. Even so, three out of 110 votes is a rarity no matter how you look at it. Over 97% of the time there were Senators straying from the position taken by the majority of their side of the aisle, not including Lieberman or Harry Reid, who as Majority Leader will often switch his vote at the last minute to the other side -- a procedural move that gives him the right to call the vote up for reconsideration at a later date.
(More here.)
Powered by Blogger
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home