Failure by Filibuster

It’s the end of the year and a good time to take stock of what we’ve accomplished over the last year. What were you hoping the Democratically-controlled Senate would have accomplished in 2007?

• Addressing global warming and energy independence?
• Universal healthcare?
• Closing the income gap?

If you had your heart set on any of these priorities, you must feel mightily disappointed. You might wonder why Congress didn’t do more. Well, the answer can be found in a simple set of numbers - 49, 51, 60, 62, 110, 134, 1973, and 2008.

There are currently 49 Republicans and 51 Democrats in the Senate. It takes 60 votes to override a filibuster (technically, vote for cloture), which the Republicans used an unprecedented 62 times to block all business in the Senate. In fact the 110th Congress is on a record-setting trajectory to force a cloture vote 134 times, the most since the cloture option was implemented in 1973. Well, there’s a cure for that – vote your priorities in 2008.

The graph below, from an article published by the Campaign for America’s Future, puts the blame squarely where it belongs on the shoulders of the Republicans and their strategy of Block and Blame.

According to Block and Blame: The Conservative Strategy of Obstruction in the 110th Congress, “So far in just the first session of the 110th Congress, Republicans have required cloture votes against filibusters 62 times. The Republicans are on pace to force 134 cloture votes, more than double the recent historical average…”

Did you get that? The Republicans are using the power of the filibuster to choke the legislative process. Republicans promised to end gridlock and instead they delivered roadblocks. They promised bipartisan cooperation. Instead they gave us partisan obstructionism

Call it what you will – Roadblock Republicans, The Grand Obstruction Party, Failure by Filibuster – but in the end it’s the American people who pay the price for party politics.

We might have been let down by the Senate’s performance in 2007, but in 2008, it’s payback time. Vote for a president who represents your priorities and give him or her a Senate who will represent you, not party politics.