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Wednesday
Jan132010

Fillibuster: Congress is totally broken

Thomas Geoghegan has a fantastic column in the New York Times explaining the mess we are in because of the perversion of the fillibuster rule. I don't know how we are going to get out of it, but... come on! You should definitely read the whole thing. Here's a key quote. Doesn't it make your blood boil?
"But the Senate, as it now operates, really has become unconstitutional: as we saw during the recent health care debacle, a 60-vote majority is required to overcome a filibuster and pass any contested bill. The founders, though, were dead set against supermajorities as a general rule, and the ever-present filibuster threat has made the Senate a more extreme check on the popular will than they ever intended" (from New York Times, "Mr. Smith Rewrites the Constitution")



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