“Sadomaschostic” Senate Procedures

A classic paragraph from Hendrik Helzberg’s Wednesday New Yorker column was examined here, offering up an  example of why Liberals are poor at politics, and don’t even seem to know it.

In the next paragraph from the very next piece, Helzberg teaches us about the “sadomasochistic” filibuster:

Thanks to my longstanding obsession with the obsolescence of our eighteenth-century political and electoral hydraulics (such as the separation of powers and the lack of a single government accountable to a national electorate) and this sclerotic system’s sadomasochistic twentieth-century refinements (such as the institutionalization of the filibuster), I am not astonished that Obama has had trouble “getting things done.”

And, immediately thereafter, he teaches us something even more extraordinary:

Absent only the filibuster—even while leaving untouched all the other monkey wrenches (committee chairs, corrupt campaign money, safe districts, Republicans, etc.)—Obama by now would have signed landmark bills addressing health care, global warming, and financial regulation, and a larger, better-designed stimulus package, too.

Let’s ignore for  now that ensuring the ability of the minority to serve as a check upon the otherwise unfettered and unrestrained will of the majority in select circumstances, is one of the most fundamental principles of a free and independent society.   What needs to be  focused on is this enormous oversight on the part of our Congressional rule proscribers, and its immediate, and absolute, correction.

Let’s put it as plainly as possible.  It was not right, it is not right now, and it never will be right, to have granted this great filibuster power — sadomasochistic or otherwise — to members of only one of our two major political parties, but yet not to the other. How this oversight occurred, is hard to imagine. But, clearly, seeing as it has, it simply must be corrected.Now.

That is, either the right to filibuster must be removed from Senatorial procedure immediately; or, the right must also be granted to members of the Democratic Party, for when they might be the minority party.

Otherwise, clearly, this is lopsided, anti democratic, and even repressive, politics.  For instance, just imagine, had this right extended to Democrats as well this past decade — when Democrats were in the minority — the bills and actions by Bush that might similarly have been prevented.

Other Links to this Post

1. Essays-Letters-Articles » Meanwhile, Over in Political Netherland…. — January 24, 2010 @

2. Donkasaurus Post » Blog Archive » Yes, Republicans Will Be Able to Filibuster Everything!! — January 24, 2010 @