Over Before It Begins
Sen. Reid's All-Nighter Runs into the Rules
By Mark I Posted in Congress — Comments (46) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
If there is a barely sentient parliamentarian in the Senate Republican leadership, Sen. Harry Reid's (D-Searchlight) proposed all night debate over Iraq may be over before the moon rises. David Freddoso has been examining the Senate rules and has discovered a tiny impediment to Reid's dream time debate. It's the notion of a quorum.
Right now, there are only 50 working Democratic Senators (Tim Johnson D, S.D. hasn't cast a vote yet this year), and there are only 49 if you don't include Joe Lieberman.
You need 51 senators for a quorum...So all it takes is one Republican to stay in the chamber, object to anything the Democrats try to do, and then note the absence of a quorum. When the quorum is called, and only 50 senators are present, the Senate adjourns, and the whole [not too well thought out] stunt is over before Senator Byrd can even begin his outraged four-hour speech.
Oh! the irony. The quorum call. You might call it the Mother of All "GOP Blocking Tactics". God, I hope someone in the Republican leadership is reading the rule book.
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"No compromise with the main purpose, no peace till victory, no pact with unrepentant wrong." - Winston Churchill
Which, of course, would be a blessing for both him and his family.
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC. I've been usurped!
As much as this whole debacle makes me ill, the thought that Reid's Dog-and-Pony debate session may be undone by their paper-thin majority is too funny.
It's hard to be Harry Reid these days. I'd almost feel sorry for him.
But, lest we forget, they're ready to govern.
When all else fails, simply revel in the absurdity of it all.
It ain't exactly "give me liberty or give me death"
"No compromise with the main purpose, no peace till victory, no pact with unrepentant wrong." - Winston Churchill
4 points need to be raised.
1) The need for a "comprehensive" Border Fence.
2) The need to hold hearings and vote "Yea" or "Nea" on a large number of judicial nominations.
3) The need to extend the Bush Tax Cuts Now!
4) A painstaking read of every positive report detailing the collapse of AQI in Buquba and in Anbar.
The GOP could long into the night with that agenda. There's no reason to let Harry Weed succesfully invoke cloture until the robbins sing and sun crests the horizon.
I'd rather see Gore get oxed than my ox get gored.
moment. The stunt was stupid and transparent enough, and add to it being ineffectual and everyone will turn on these fine folks.
I hope Liebermann asks for a quorum, and then leaves the chambers and the party.
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Develop alternatives to existing policies and keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes the politically inevitable. Milton Friedman
like the Maine sisters, Warner, etc.
They could give them a quorum.
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Develop alternatives to existing policies and keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes the politically inevitable. Milton Friedman
Yes, the Democrats need somebody to raise a quorum but there are too many potentials (Snowe, Domenici, Hagel etc.) to risk this strategy. Note it is the Republican's that have to do the filibustering. The Democrats want an up and down vote and can't get it because the Republican's are threatening filibustering and therefore forcing cloture votes.
If Republicans went with this strategy then they'd have one guy to provide the filbuster all night and when he/she went to the bathroom they'd vote and have an overwhelming majority of those present (I'm kidding, but you see my point).
Any two Republicans who may want to allow this debate (Hagel, Collins, Smith) will have to be personally in the chamber for the duration.
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Develop alternatives to existing policies and keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes the politically inevitable. Milton Friedman
If the Dems have 49 (meaning they can't get Lieberman to show up) then they need one anti war Republican to make 50. Pro war Republican's have to have at least one person filibustering to stop the up and down vote which makes the quorum.
One person can filibuster....but I'm not sure of the rules when he steps away (to take a leak, and therefore debate has stopped), how long it takes to call a vote.
51 are required for a quorum.
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Develop alternatives to existing policies and keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes the politically inevitable. Milton Friedman
In the event that the filibusterer is not part of the vote taking then they are back down to 49 (assume he's collapsed from exhaustion) and it takes two defecting Republicans to get that done.
But note the defecting Republican's DO NOT have to be there all the time (only the filibusterer has to be there all the time). So the whip just waits until the one filibustere stops then calls a vote (including Hagel, Snowe, Domenici et al). If less than two of the defectors show up then they will not have a quorum and the vote cannot take place. All true, but risky.
The better strategy is show up with a bigger delegation of filibusterers and go at it for as long as it takes.
called a flat earther and obstructionist for being one of 10 members who took advantage of a similar quorum rule and forced all business, including calls to recess, require a 2/3 vote of the members present rather than a simple majority. We successfully interfered with the majority's plans for over an hour as the Sargent at Arms' people scoured the State House and the local bars for us.
Was one of the best times we had that year!
frankly, I love the idea of all night Senate debate. I am sick and tired of paying for their salaries while they jet off on one vacation after another. Let them debate, maybe sometime around four in the morning one of the Democrats can explain what will happen to Iraq after our troops leave. By the way, our troops have a lot more confidence in the mission than the Dems. They don't however have much confidence in the reporting. I can only assume they exclude Michael Yon from that group.
http://www.defenselink.mil//news/newsarticle.aspx?id=46738
"The nine most dangerous words in the English language are 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help'"
Ronald Reagan
Texas Democrats tried to do this over redistricting? They were able to hold out for a little while, but eventually they were forced back to the legislature. That will probably happen here too, in some form or another.
In those cases they went into hiding to prevent a quorum. In this case the Republicans aren't boycotting the Senate entirely, just dealing with this stupid unnecessary all-night stunt.
Reid controls the agenda.
If he doesn't move on to new business the Republicans have to keep filibustering on the topic on the floor indefinitely. Days or even weeks.
If there's only one filibusterer he eventually falls asleep.
When he does Reid just has call all the anti-war folk in (which would include the defectors) have a vote and thats the quorum and majority.
Of course the Republicans could get one person in the senate and rotate that one person. Never having more than one in the Senate at one moment but also never stopping debate....that would work!
He can't hold a vote until cloture passes, which doesn't happen until he has 60 votes. You need to have one person there to object to everything and to make sure no votes are taken without cloture votes being taken first.
Harry Reid gets beat at his own game. Oh, the irony of it. Can we impeach Harry?
Q> What is the difference between Harry Reid's call for an all night Senate session to trash President Bush,and Ann Coulter?
A> Senator Reid's action is a 'cunning stunt'.
...to let us know when you're prepared to act better than a 12 year old.
And I detest Ann Coulter, mind you.
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC. I've been usurped!
I would submit that the Iraqi parliament is in fact more effective than the US Congress under Democrat leadership.
If a quorum is not reached then the Majority Leader can make a motion to direct the Sergeant at Arms to request, and, when necessary, to compel the attendance of the absent Senators. Such a motion would require only a vote of the majority of the Senators present which likely will pass easily given that only the Democrats would be present.
1. A quorum shall consist of a majority of the Senators duly chosen and sworn.
2. No Senator shall absent himself from the service of the Senate without leave.
3. If, at any time during the daily sessions of the Senate, a question shall be raised by any Senator as to the presence of a quorum, the Presiding Officer shall forthwith direct the Secretary to call the roll and shall announce the result, and these proceedings shall be without debate.
4. Whenever upon such roll call it shall be ascertained that a quorum is not present, a majority of the Senators present may direct the Sergeant at Arms to request, and, when necessary, to compel the attendance of the absent Senators, which order shall be determined without debate; and pending its execution, and until a quorum shall be present, no debate nor motion, except to adjourn, or to recess pursuant to a previous order entered by unanimous consent, shall be in order.
So, while it might delay things slightly it won't force the senate to adjourn.
They could hang out with Cheney at his undisclosed secure location for the night, after all.
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(Formerly known as bee) / Internet member since 1987
Member of the Surreality-Based Community
Don't tell anybody, but the "undisclosed location" has always been the pool hall down at the strip mall close to where I live.
It's war -- so when can we start shooting back at the enemy Democrats?
but if the Sgt at Arms is going to come knocking at their doors in the middle of the night, he'd better darn well be sure that all the Democratic Senators running for President are present. Obama had a photo op at a picket line in Chicago this afternoon. Any squawking about that?
And any of them that do show up and just take naps as far as I'm concerned.
"[Filibustering] is wrong. It’s not supportable under the Constitution. And if they insist on persisting with these filibusters, I’m perfectly prepared to blow the place up."
- Sen Trent Lott
It would be nice to be able to win the debate without becoming hypocrites. I'm getting a bit tired of the "they did it too" defense. Can't we take the high ground?
Go find a link and tell us just exactly what were the Dems filibustering when Lott made that statement.
Envisioning when all that is Left is the Right.
The 'we' here, combined with ignorance of the key distinction of that debate that everyone engaged knew about, says it all, really.
Run like Reagan!
The Dems were filibustering an up or down vote on judicial nominees, now the Republican are filibustering an up or down vote on Iraq.
I know the distinction. And by "we", I'm referring to Republicans - conservatives and libertarians - that have a moral high ground in this and many other debates. My apologies if I may have mistakenly included Mr Stevens above. I'll refrain from the use of "we" in the future.
But I'll reiterate: If all that can be done is to become more like the libs, then it's a sad state indeed.
A solid determined minority can force a bill to be tweaked by filibustering. A nominee (whether for a judicial position or a cabinet position or an ambassadorship or whatever else) is the person - there's nothing to tweak.
Now certainly both parties have abused filibustering of bills from time to time - filibustering for the purposes of defeating rather than tweaking. And certainly there were some Clinton nominees that the GOP dragged their feet on for whatever reason. But the Democrats have taken this filibustering of judicial nominees way beyondd the pale of anything that makes sense.
I would similarly argue that committee votes have become ridiculous. The Senate Judiciary Committee should hold hearings to make sure that a candidate is qualified and doesn't have any huge skeletons in their closet. Assuming so, then they should pass them to the floor even if they plan to vote against them - those should be different sets of considerations. But what the Dems have done is stacked the SJC with some of the most liberal Senators, meaning that handful of Senators can kill any nominee (except for Supreme Court). This is ridiculous as well.
Good point, bk. Not sure I feel any better about the upcoming filibuster, but it does put things in a better context.
The committees are sore point for me, too. One of the main reasons there are so many earmarks, in my opinion. I'm at a loss on how to fix it. Term limits on committees, maybe, but that would bother me on principle. Though maybe there is a difference between term limits on elections (which is anti-democracy) vs. term limits on committees.
The whole Dems did it too arguement has gotten very old. I am not sure conservative leadership should defend their position with Clinton thought it was okay. We impeached him for a reason after all.
The whole Dems did it too arguement has gotten very old. I am not sure conservative leadership should defend their position with Clinton thought it was okay. We impeached him for a reason after all.
I tend not to give much credence to dishonest people who come over to Redstate to condemn Republicans for employing tactics Democrats regularly use without hesitation, justification or apology.
Usually, they push it with charges of "hypocrisy" and Moby demands for us to be "better than them" ... just like you.
Here's my problem; how do we get the Democrats to stop using these underhanded tactics if they don't get to feel it coming from the other side? Following your advice, (assuming you're genuine) results in a win-win for them - they can obstruct all they wish without fear of any consequences because we're too busy cuddling the "moral high ground" to make use of the same opportunity.
In the end, they win, we lose. The "moral high ground" is a poor substitute for letting bad policy become law when one can stop it.
George W. Bush: He's A Folder ... Not A Fighter.
because we know Lieberman will not caucus on Iraq with the Dems, so it will be over before it starts, I live for this type of irony.