Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) told Morning Joe today that he’s opposed to changing the Senate’s filibuster rules. He also spoke to the virtues of partisanship.
Dodd, who recently announced he will retire from the Senate this year, said he thinks it would be “foolish” to change filibuster rules.
“I’m totally opposed to the idea of changing the filibuster rules. I think that’s foolish, in my view,” he said.
The problem, he said, was a lack of civility in the Senate, stemming from a lack of “chemistry” among senators.
“You can write all the rules you want, but at the end of the day, if the chemistry isn’t there” you don’t have a functioning Senate, he said.
There’s a movement to change the filibuster rules, lead by Sens. Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), but Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has dismissed the idea.
Dodd was asked about Sen. Evan Bayh’s (D-IN) retirement announcement yesterday, in which he said that the Senate is “dysfunctional” with “brain-dead partisanship.” Dodd disagreed.
“There’s nothing wrong with partisanship. I think we’ve got to get over this notion that there’s something inherently evil about partisanship. This country was founded in partisanship,” he said. The problem, he said, is “the lack of civility. It’s the inability to compromise.”
Watch:
(H/T The Hill)
