June 10, 2005
Rethinking the Filibuster “Compromise” ::
legal — tagged judges, legal, politics and US senate
12:53 pm
So, I’ve been rethinking my position on the filibuster deal. Although when the deal came out I was optimistic, I’ve all but decided that it was in fact not really much of a deal at all, that it was in fact something more like what The New Republic described. What’s the source of my change of heart? See Political Animal:
Two of the five were shoo-ins, so what [Senator Lindsey] Graham was telling us was that of the three controversial nominees (Owen, Brown, and Pryor), Republicans themselves would end up killing at least one of them. So how did things turn out?
I’ll tell you how things turned out: all the passed through. You know, much of my support of the compromise was based on an assumption that it was going to actually mean something. But clearly I was wrong. I really hate when I look back on my past optimism and realize that I should have been more cynical about things.
Ah, well. Maybe the New Republic was right. But at least I can sleep calmly knowing that an aggressive Irish Setter won’t be on the federal judiciary any time soon.
