For Trump, size clearly matters; reality, not so much

[Tomef]

OK… then you need to clarify “states” vs. “countries”.

Venezuela for one. You start with left leaning teachers in schools and universities (which is already happening here) and then the rest follows suit.

State/nation/country. Outside of the US, state means country,

 

[Kenny]

What you offered is not really an explanation, or, rather, it’s a Fox News explanation, which goes as follows: [insert dubious factoid/exaggeration/wild hyperbole] is happening right now! “Obviously” this can only mean imminent communism/election fraud [etc]. An actual explanation would require infinitely more than that if you want to justify - by means of reference to actual events in the real world - this idea that questioning the filibuster indicates intent to turn the US into a communist state.

I wonder if this is the reason why many in MAGA-land don’t like the quality press. Reality is complex and difficult to understand and explain, hence MAGAs tend to be turned off by complicated and nuanced reporting, preferring the simplistic notions of Tucker Carlson and the like, regardless of how limited they are.

Another “i approve of this message” political ad.

What purpose does the filibuster serve other than as a crude way for the unscrupulous to scupper the plans of the opposite party? Can you provide an instance of when you think it has been used in an effective manner to benefit citizens? Please also explain why you think this use was effective, you could also consider why it might not be seen as effective. That’s how real explanations are arrived at, by considering more than one POV. If you start off from the premise that whatever you happen to think is just somehow logical, just because, you can’t expect anyone who doesn’t already agree with your general worldview to accept it as an explanation.

It was actually designed to slow the government down. If there is any change that needs to happen, is to go back to its original purpose - pre 1970 when Dem Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield worked a “two-track” system allowing the Senate, by unanimous consent or the approval of the minority leader, to bypass a filibustered bill and go on to another. Before, a senator had the job of talking through the night and, but by passing it, it relieved his colleagues of their frustration.

It was designed to promote debate.

That being said, majority atomic-bomb option means that the minority looses its voice and gets overrun.

 

[Tomef]

Another “i approve of this message” political ad.

Another attempt to penetrate the propagandised brain.

It was actually designed to slow the government down. If there is any change that needs to happen, is to go back to its original purpose - pre 1970 when Dem Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield worked a “two-track” system allowing the Senate, by unanimous consent or the approval of the minority leader, to bypass a filibustered bill and go on to another. Before, a senator had the job of talking through the night and, but by passing it, it relieved his colleagues of their frustration.

It was designed to promote debate.

That being said, majority atomic-bomb option means that the minority looses its voice and gets overrun

You don’t see the narrowness of this view? When it’s something you approve of, you go to the theory, what it was, in your opinion, designed for. When you don’t approve, it’s a communist plot.

Most of the democratic world manages perfectly well without a filibuster. The notion that without such a ham-fisted measure socialism is inevitable is just plain daft. Why believe it? It certainly isn’t a logical conclusion.

 

[Copernicus]

You have to be blind to history to say something so ridiculous. A seat became vacant under President Obama many months before an election, but the Republican-controlled Senate would not even bring it up for a vote until Trump took office.

That is the correct historical fact although they didn’t know if Trump wold win. As a matter of fact, people didn’t think he would win.

They didn't know Trump would be the nominee when they started this game. It wasn't about Trump. It was about stopping a Democratic president from exercising his constitutional prerogative to appoint a Supreme Court justice--pure and unprecedented partisan overreach designed to thwart the spirit of the Constitution. While most people expected Trump to be defeated in 2016, polls showed that he had a reasonable chance to win the electoral count, which is what happened. Trump lost the majority, but he won with the Republicans' structural advantage in the electoral college count.

Then they rushed through both of Trump's nominations in expedited hearings with very limited vetting of the candidates. Barrett's nomination was rushed so quickly that it was approved literally days before the presidential election in 2020 in order to keep the appointment away from Democrats.

That was the Senate’s job, not Trump.

Nonsense. Trump was working with a list of conservative anti-abortion Supreme Court nominees that were handpicked by the Federalist Society. Senate leaders knew that, because he was using the same list to vet the politics of his other nominees for federal court positions. It was well known during Trump's administration that Trump was working hand in glove with Senate leaders to pack as many conservative federal judges as possible. He did so with record speed.

Trump's packing of the Supreme Court with partisan Senate power-grabbing made heads spin.

Trump did not pack the Supreme Court, he filled available seats. “Packing” would be when you purposefully add 6 more seats to get the Supreme Court to vote your way.

All of this is historical fact.

Today the Supreme Court is well balanced with it sometimes going liberal in decisions, sometimes conservative and sometimes 9-0 unanimous voting.

Kenny, there are many ways to "pack the court", one of which is to increase the justices on a particular court so that a new majority can be created. However, it can also refer to keeping the number the same and just changing the political makeup of the court to achieve a specific partisan political goal, because the aim of increasing the number is only to change the political balance on the court. When FDR tried to pack the Supreme Court back in 1937, he wanted to add six new justices that would presumably rubber stamp his New Deal agenda. SCOTUS had been overturning a number of his initiatives, and he wanted to change the politics of the court.

Politics had always played a role in Supreme Court picks, but presidents rarely get a chance to appoint more than one or two of the members of the court. So the process has been slow. Since Roe v Wade, the number of Catholics appointed to SCOTUS has skyrocketed for that reason, because many anti-abortion judges tend to be Catholic. The Federalist Society had compiled a list of Supreme Court nominees precisely for the purpose of overturning Roe v Wade. So it is arguably the case that the court has been specifically packed with anti-abortion justices, even though a solid majority (63%) of Americans believe that abortions should be legal.

 

[Tomef]

Another “i approve of this message” political ad.


It was actually designed to slow the government down. If there is any change that needs to happen, is to go back to its original purpose - pre 1970 when Dem Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield worked a “two-track” system allowing the Senate, by unanimous consent or the approval of the minority leader, to bypass a filibustered bill and go on to another. Before, a senator had the job of talking through the night and, but by passing it, it relieved his colleagues of their frustration.

It was designed to promote debate.

That being said, majority atomic-bomb option means that the minority looses its voice and gets overrun.

Do you have an example of it being usefully, to achieve something of benefit to the general public?

 

[Kenny]

You don’t see the narrowness of this view? When it’s something you approve of, you go to the theory, what it was, in your opinion, designed for. When you don’t approve, it’s a communist plot.

Most of the democratic world manages perfectly well without a filibuster. The notion that without such a ham-fisted measure socialism is inevitable is just plain daft. Why believe it? It certainly isn’t a logical conclusion.

We are not a “Democracy” - we are a Republic.

And all you have offered is an opinion and not a rebuttal of why it was there in the first place, nor have you proved me wrong. You even went off on a tangent of “state” without dealing with my answer.

 

[Tomef]

We are not a “Democracy” - we are a Republic.

And all you have offered is an opinion and not a rebuttal of why it was there in the first place, nor have you proved me wrong. You even went off on a tangent of “state” without dealing with my answer.

Why would I rebut why it’s there? You’re not telling me anything I don’t know. What I asked you for was an example of it being used usefully, not why it exists. The US is part of the democratic world, Republic or not. I can’t tell if you’re just confused or being disingenuous. My experience tells me probably the latter, MAGAs are notorious for bad faith and dishonesty. You’re not doing yourself any favours by miring your character in a world of half-truths, equivocation, flat out lies and evasions.

 

[Tomef]

Not to mention trying to get non-citizens to vote:

https://www.npr.org/2021/12/15/1064...legal-non-citizens-to-vote-in-local-elections

Did you read/listen to this?

These are all utensils, as you say, “the crap Hitler used”…

Which of these instances is something Hitler used?

It's an observable fact, for example, that Trump's 'saviour of the nation' rhetoric and his dehumanising and scapegoating of others matches Hitler's campaign rhetoric. What is comparable from Hitler's rise to power in anything you have mentioned in relation to the Democrats? Please be specific.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Another “i approve of this message” political ad.

You think that post was an "I approve of this message" political ad???

This post:

What you offered is not really an explanation, or, rather, it’s a Fox News explanation, which goes as follows: [insert dubious factoid/exaggeration/wild hyperbole] is happening right now! “Obviously” this can only mean imminent communism/election fraud [etc]. An actual explanation would require infinitely more than that if you want to justify - by means of reference to actual events in the real world - this idea that questioning the filibuster indicates intent to turn the US into a communist state.

I wonder if this is the reason why many in MAGA-land don’t like the quality press. Reality is complex and difficult to understand and explain, hence MAGAs tend to be turned off by complicated and nuanced reporting, preferring the simplistic notions of Tucker Carlson and the like, regardless of how limited they are.


Do explain, instead of just brushing it off with your strange label.

It was actually designed to slow the government down. If there is any change that needs to happen, is to go back to its original purpose - pre 1970 when Dem Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield worked a “two-track” system allowing the Senate, by unanimous consent or the approval of the minority leader, to bypass a filibustered bill and go on to another. Before, a senator had the job of talking through the night and, but by passing it, it relieved his colleagues of their frustration.

It was designed to promote debate.

That being said, majority atomic-bomb option means that the minority looses its voice and gets overrun.

 

[SkepticThinker]

We are not a “Democracy” - we are a Republic.

And all you have offered is an opinion and not a rebuttal of why it was there in the first place, nor have you proved me wrong. You even went off on a tangent of “state” without dealing with my answer.

A republic is a form of democracy.

 

[Revoltingest]

Another “i approve of this message” political ad.

You've worn that joke out.
It works only if used occasionally & appropriately.

 

[Kenny]

Why would I rebut why it’s there? You’re not telling me anything I don’t know. What I asked you for was an example of it being used usefully, not why it exists. The US is part of the democratic world, Republic or not. I can’t tell if you’re just confused or being disingenuous. My experience tells me probably the latter, MAGAs are notorious for bad faith and dishonesty. You’re not doing yourself any favours by miring your character in a world of half-truths, equivocation, flat out lies and evasions.

Another political advertisement.

 

[Kenny]

You've worn that joke out.
It works only if used occasionally & appropriately.

But it has become so prevalent… can I help it?

 

[Revoltingest]

can I help it?

Yes.
By not being a broken record.

 

[Tomef]

Another political advertisement.

Do you have an example of the filibuster being used to good effect, or not?

 

[Kenny]

Do you have an example of the filibuster being used to good effect, or not?

To stop the effort to eliminate the Electoral College

 

[Tomef]

To stop the effort to eliminate the Electoral College

Ok, would you agree that's something people would have different views on, as to whether or not it was a good thing? According to this article ( Opinion | The Filibuster That Saved the Electoral College (Published 2021) ), the divide at the time was not partisan but either ideological or the result of vested interests:

'The dispute over the Electoral College wasn’t partisan, as it is today. “The paramount issue,” said Senator Howard Baker, the Tennessee Republican, “is the fundamental right of every citizen to cast a vote that has no more weight nor no less weight than that of any other citizen.”'

The article has a pretty negative view of the whole thing. It also claims that minorities have other protections within the institution of the senate, and that the only purpose of the filibuster is to stop things, not debate them, which the history of its application seems to bear out. It concludes:

“Boiled down to the essentials,” Mr. Keyssar writes, “reform was blocked by a coalition of Southern Democrats and small-state conservative Republicans. The 34 senators who voted nay came from states with 27 percent of the nation’s population.”

Do you have a link to something that portrays the whole episode in a more positive light?

 

[metis]

We are not a “Democracy” - we are a Republic.

We're both: Types of democracy - Wikipedia

 

[metis]

It's an observable fact, for example, that Trump's 'saviour of the nation' rhetoric and his dehumanising and scapegoating of others matches Hitler's campaign rhetoric. What is comparable from Hitler's rise to power in anything you have mentioned in relation to the Democrats? Please be specific.

Another political advertisement.

It clearly is not-- it's reality.

During the last VP debate, Vance even admitted he would not have certified the last elation even though the vast majority of Trump's high-level appointees said that there was no significant evidence of voter fraud enough to question the doubt about the election. Matter of fact, if you remember Fox was the 1st major station to announce Biden won, and their viewership plummeted.

.

 

[Kenny]

Ok, would you agree that's something people would have different views on, as to whether or not it was a good thing? According to this article ( Opinion | The Filibuster That Saved the Electoral College (Published 2021) ), the divide at the time was not partisan but either ideological or the result of vested interests:

I would agree to that and more… just about anything we have will contain different views even for the Constitution on whether we should view it as an originalist or as a living document.

There is always a divide to such an extent that we have multiple parties as well as independents. Each one has a different view.

'The dispute over the Electoral College wasn’t partisan, as it is today. “The paramount issue,” said Senator Howard Baker, the Tennessee Republican, “is the fundamental right of every citizen to cast a vote that has no more weight nor no less weight than that of any other citizen.”'

The article has a pretty negative view of the whole thing. It also claims that minorities have other protections within the institution of the senate, and that the only purpose of the filibuster is to stop things, not debate them, which the history of its application seems to bear out. It concludes:

“Boiled down to the essentials,” Mr. Keyssar writes, “reform was blocked by a coalition of Southern Democrats and small-state conservative Republicans. The 34 senators who voted nay came from states with 27 percent of the nation’s population.”

Do you have a link to something that portrays the whole episode in a more positive light?

So, what we can agree here is :

1) Filibuster worked
2) Depending on the outcome, one will say “We need it” or “We should throw it in the garbage”. (which isn’t the point)
3) Everyone will have a different viewpoint.