Obstructionism
Posted at 1:57am on Jun. 14, 2008 *Ahem*
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
Kevin Drum says that "filling the amendment tree"--a method by which Senate floor leaders got to control the content of amendments to a bill and locked their opponents out of offering what those floor leaders considered objectionable amendments to the bill--fell out of favor as a Senate practice "until the mid-90s, when Bob Dole rediscovered it and made it into a standard tool of GOP governance."
Um . . . no:
Robert Byrd, the crafty and theatrical chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, has been at the center of the fight over President Clinton's proposal to spend $16.3 billion to stimulate the economy this year.
As floor manager for the Clinton legislation, Byrd has confronted hostile Republicans and reluctant Democrats with moves that confirmed his reputation as a master of parliamentary finagling and oratory.
His rhetoric has entertained, but his tactics have infuriated minority Republicans who are threatening to delay Clinton's bill with a filibuster.
Almost single-handedly, Byrd has used his detailed knowledge of the Senate rules to shepherd Clinton's economic-stimulus package through the mine-filled territory of the Senate. Using Senate rules to do a maneuver called "filling up the amendment tree," Byrd has all but precluded major modifications to Clinton's $16 billion package.
(Emphasis mine.) This fight occurred in 1993, during Clinton's first year and preceded Dole's use of amendment tree-filling--by Drum's own account, since Dole didn't start using the tactic himself "until the mid-90s"--and it was this tactic, employed in the fight over the Clinton stimulus package, that prompted Senate Republicans to successfully filibuster the package and kill it in the Senate. Anyone who has read Bob Woodward's The Agenda is aware of this. According to Woodward, when Byrd finished enthusiastically telling Clinton about his parliamentary scheme to pass the stimulus package, Clinton responded not by decrying the fact that the Byrd tactic "prevents anyone else from offering amendments," but by saying approvingly "Thank you Mr. Chairman. Let's pass the bill."
On another matter, Drum contends that "the Senate's decline began long ago, and mostly under Republican rule" because "[t]he GOP has perfected the art of filibustering, withholding consent, abusing the markup procedure, and just generally obstructing virtually everything that comes before the Senate, regardless of how important it is. The normal give-and-take of legislative compromise isn't in their playbook these days." Indeed. How dare the Republicans argue against and take a stand against Democratic agenda items they find objectionable? You would almost think that the GOP was an opposition party, or something.
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