Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is on a kick. Personally frustrated, and under pressure from the left, Reid has decided to take direct aim at Republican obstruction, and he's doing so in angry terms.
"For anybody watching, what's taken place the last three years knows the Republicans have become experts in wasting time, the American taxpayers' time, the American people's time, and yesterday was no exception," Reid said on the Senate floor Wednesday.
Democrats can't pass off all of the blame for the glacial pace of progress in the last several months. With a 60-member caucus, they in theory have sufficient numbers to overcome GOP filibusters of key agenda items, if they could only agree to stay united. But even if they did muscle their agenda through the procedural labyrinth of the Senate, they still wouldn't be able to stop the foot-dragging.
Republicans have threatened to filibuster 58 times this year. Thirty times, they've actually forced cloture votes--and when cloture is invoked, the Senate must usually wait hours before the underlying issue can pass. More crucially, they've also blocked nominations and legislation and delayed proceedings in other ways, all of which waste precious legislating hours in a body that spends almost as much time out of session as it does in session. This week Reid was steamed that individual members had forced three cloture votes on a bill to extend unemployment compensation. Each of these filibusters delayed progress on the bill by hours, and yet, at the end of the day, the overwhelming majority of the GOP ultimately voted for cloture.
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/11/reid-continues-to-target-republican-obstruction.php?ref=fpb
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