A longtime reader and Dem operative sounds off on political reporters …
I just read the piece about filibuster by your reporter correspondent, and it is useful for what it says about 1994, but even more useful for explaining why “the reporters who cover congress” play a far bigger role in the disfunction of the political process then they are willing to countenance.
Your correspondent’s “pox on both their houses” re: the filibuster is, simply horse#$%^. He states:
It all boils down to this: One party likes the filibuster when it is in the minority and hates the filibuster when it is in the majority.
Remember, just a few years ago the Democrats were filibustering all kinds of judges. They loved it then. Republicans hated it while they were in charge during that same period, and now they love using it.
This statement ignored two easily checkable facts. 1) in the last two congress their has been an exponential increase of in the use of the filibuster. It’s not hard to find 2) Judges were different. You know how I know? REPUBLICANS TOLD ME SO! They argued the filibuster was unconstitutional because it was judges – they were extremely careful to say that they wanted to preserve the filibuster for legislative issues.
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