Cogito Ergo Non Serviam

Senate Fails to End Filibusters on XL Pipeline, NSA Reform

If ever a rule of a parliamentary chamber rendered that chamber useless, it is the filibuster in the US Senate as it is currently used. Thanks to the use of the filibuster on every bill in the Senate by the minority Republican Party, the Senate is unable to function as envisioned by the founders or as seems desirable by those who believe in republican self-government by the people. Yesterday's failures to end debate on the Keystone XL Pipeline and on reforming the spying habits of the National Security Agency merely add further proof that the rule needs to go.

As noted in yesterday's posting at this website, the shenanigans over the pipeline were a doomed attempt by the Democrats to salvage the Senate seat of doomed candidate Mary Landrieu of Louisiana ahead of her run-off election next month. The hypothesis was that if she could force the approval of the pipeline, Louisiana voters would be so grateful for the oil refining jobs that would follow that she could overcome a 8-16 point deficit to save her seat.

Mercifully, this bad idea failed to achieve the 60 votes needed to end debate, falling 1 vote short. Shamefully for Democrats, that one vote could be attributed to independent Senator Angus King of Maine, who does caucus with them. Party discipline has never been a Democratic virtue, but in the face of a GOP takeover of the Senate next year, it would have been exceedingly useful for the party to appear united. After 18 years, if Ms. Landrieu truly needed the pipeline vote to secure her seat, she has done a poor job and deserves to lose.

Meanwhile, a motion to end debate on a bill to end the National Security Agency's bulk collection of phone records also failed on a 58 to 42 vote. This wasn't entirely along party lines, but close enough. Forty-one Republicans and rightist Democrat Bill Nelson of Florida voted no. There was some good news given the composition of the inadequate majority, both Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Rand Paul (R-KY) stuck to their libertarian principles to back the bill.

When the GOP takes over the Senate in January, it is certain that they will pass the pipeline bill in one form or another (which the president will veto, which in turn will not be overridden) and the NSA bill will not get to the floor.

Without the filibuster, the pipeline bill would likely have passed and been vetoed, which would have been sustained (exactly the same result the nation will get next year). The NSA bill would likely have passed, and the president may well have vetoed that as well. The NSA defends the practice of bulk collection, and the president could, by executive order, curtail that substantially. In other words, the filibuster merely protects Senators in these two instances from having to vote directly on the pipeline and NSA surveillance. And smudging over one's record is a good way to get re-elected.

One does not have a problem with the idea of the majority's will having limitations to protect the rights of a minority. That is, in fact, the basis of the Bill of Rights. The problem lies in a rule that limits the majority's right to act at all simply because the minority wishes to be difficult.

The filibuster has outlived whatever usefulness it had. The practice now is such that the US Senate cannot act without a 3/5 majority, rendering it unable to function. The filibuster needs to go, but the GOP will approve it again when the next Congress convenes. They are likely to lose the Senate in 2016, and they know it. No reason to give up a weapon like that just because one is ahead for a brief time.

© Copyright 2014 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.



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