Even Americans with short attention spans or little interest in politics will recall the backslapping and self-congratulatory statements from the "gang of 14" Senators who brokered a deal earlier this week on President Bush's judicial nominations.
You may have seen the words of my own Senator Graham of South Carolina who had this to say about the deal:
"The American people won tonight. The Senate is back in business....With better communication and a spirit of putting the country ahead of ourselves, I believe we can avoid future filibusters. We are a nation at war which desperately needs a functioning Senate. Our men and women in harms way deserve Senators with personal courage and respect fo the institution. They are risking their lives to defend our freedom and those of us in the Senate should have the courage to put the welfare of the country ahead of our own personal political interests. That's the least we should do. "
Senator Graham has been very vocal about the need to keep the Senate working and the "deal" being key to preserving the working relationships necessary for the Senate to do the people's business.
Yet here we go again. After exhaustive hearings, repeated delays and an organized smear campaign against the nomination of John Bolton to be our Ambassador to the United Nations, Democrats defeated a cloture vote that would have ended debate on Bolton and allowed a vote on his confirmation. Democrat Minority Leader Reid insisted that this was not a filibuster.
Yet, any succesful vote against cloture (which requires 60 votes to pass) means a filibuster is taking place. The definition here is even clearer than the "extraordinary circumstances" which the deal on judicial nominees would allow for filibusters.
So how did the "gang of 14", those who wanted the country to move ahead with important business vote on this filibuster? All the Republican members of that cabal voted for cloture and an end to the filibuster. Four of the Democrats voted to continue the filibuster, with Inouye not voting and only Landrieu and Pryor voting against the filibuster.
Another vote is scheduled for June 7. Once again, the people's business at this important time is being held hostage to a minority of Senate Democrats who offer the people little else but obstruction and delay.
In the office of Senator Graham, they've been getting so much heat from the voters of South Carolina, they had to bring in bags of ice and stack them like sand bags to deflect the ire of angy conservatives.
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