Second Amendment Harry Reid Moves to Destroy the Senate Rules that are Blocking Passage of Gun Control

DarkLight · Jul 11, 2013

Got the notification about this via email and then hit the source:

You can’t be “just a little bit pregnant.”

Similarly, you can’t cheat “just a little.”

Once you have made it clear that you are willing to break the rules in order to win, the rules are meaningless.

So it is with some alarm that we note that Harry Reid -- in an exercise of raw power -- intends within the next week to try to openly break the Senate rules in order to confirm all pending Executive Branch nominees.

You may remember that, at the beginning of the year, Reid made the specious argument that you could change the rules at the beginning of a two-year congressional session -- and only at the beginning of the congressional session.

Well, we are no longer at the start of the term.

A quarter of the 113th Congress had now come and gone. And even the pseudo-intellectual arguments for obliterating the Senate rules are gone.

This is an exercise in raw political power. This is an effort by Reid to say: “I can cheat whenever I want. And no one can stop me.”

The first showdown case will occur over efforts to fill the National Labor Relations Board. You may remember that Obama was slapped down by the courts for appointing these “members” as “recess appointments” when Congress wasn’t in recess.

Now, having been caught cheating, Obama and Reid are threatening to tip over the chess board in order to confirm these illegal “recess appointments.”

But that’s just the beginning.

Once it is impossible to filibuster Executive Branch appointments, Obama will soon carry through on his word to slam through a rabidly anti-gun zealot to head the ATF.

And does anyone think that the Senate would comply with the niceties of the rules it has obliterated -- if what was at stake was an anti-gun zealot nominated to the Supreme Court in order to overturn the Heller and McDonald decisions?

Finally, it is just not credible for Reid to say: “I’m going to cheat. But I’m going to define the way in which I cheat to limit my cheating to this narrow way.”

All year, MSNBC has been whining that Democrat gun control has been thwarted by the Senate filibuster rules.

If the Senate’s filibuster rules are obliterated, you can be sure that the Toomey-Manchin amendment -- with its universal gun registries -- would soon be brought up again and passed.

Gun owners should realize that the Feinstein gun and magazine bans lost by such a large margin only because a lot of anti-gun senators knew they would not muster the 60 votes needed. If there were a 50-vote margin -- and their votes made a difference -- many of these anti-gunners would switch their votes and pass Feinstein.

So the reason gun control did not pass is because the Senate rules allowing us to filibuster it. They may seem dry and boring, but the question of whether we win or lose will depend on them.

ACTION: Contact Your Senator . Tell him to oppose Harry Reid’s “cheat scheme” to violate the Senate rules in order to change the Senate rules.
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Harry Reid Moves to Destroy the Senate Rules that are Blocking Passage of Gun Control - Gun Owners of America

tulianr · Jul 12, 2013

While I acknowledge the potential for abuse that this rule change carries with it, and the potential for unintended consequences, I also think that the confirmation process has become a ridiculous game to the idiots in the Senate. I believe that the idea of Senate confirmation of cabinet appointees was instituted to prevent political cronyism and unlimited partisan control of the executive branch; but certainly during my lifetime, the Senate has turned the confirmation process into a perverse political game show. It is nothing but political partisanship. I'd like to see the process streamlined.

And frankly, while I applaud the use of the filibuster when it is used to support positions that I agree with, I deplore it when it is used to oppose positions that I agree with. I'm not sure that, in general, it's conducive to the conduct of appropriate legislative business. It just gives our non-representatives the excuse to get absolutely nothing accomplished while being paid with our money.

natshare · Jul 15, 2013

The funny thing is, the leftists believe that by pointing their finger at the right, and yelling about how obstructionist they are, they'll win more votes.....but that the same voters who are smart enough to figure that out, won't notice that the left is cheating the system, and pushing their agenda, and the consequences be damned!

tulianr · Jul 15, 2013

Here's a piece on the filibuster question that I thought was interesting.

Why the constitutional option on the filibuster matters

By Scott Bomboy

EXCERPTS:
Majority leader Harry Reid is edging closer to ending the filibuster in the Senate for some types of votes. So why does the nuclear or constitutional option about the filibuster matter so much?

According to reports on Wednesday, Reid and Democrats in the Senate will huddle this week to decide on a procedural move to kill the filibuster for executive-branch nominations by ensuring there is a time limit on debate on the floor along with a time limit on votes.
......

The filibuster matters because it allows the minority party in the Senate to block votes on executive and judicial nominees, and legislation, by forcing 60 of the 100 Senate members to agree to end a debate.

Since the Democrats don’t control 60 Senate votes, the Republicans have been able to block nominations or get concessions without having a Senate majority.

The Democrats are upset with Republican resistance to several nominations made by President Barack Obama to head executive agencies.

A key point appears to be a potential “silent” filibuster of appointments to the National Labor Relations Board. Three of the five NLRB members were recess appointments by President Obama.
......

A court challenge to the filibuster from Common Cause was shot down last December in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

“The court is firmly convinced that to intrude into this area would offend the separation of powers on which the Constitution rests,” Judge Emmet Sullivan said. “Nowhere does the Constitution contain express requirements regarding the proper length of, or method for, the Senate to debate proposed legislation.”
......

In fact, the House also had the filibuster at one time, but it ended its use in 1842.

The Senate battle has been brewing since January, when Reid and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell reached a compromise on filibuster rules.

The nomination of Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel was then subject to a filibuster, which ruffled a lot of feathers.

The Senate eventually voted 71-27 to end the “silent filibuster” over Hagel’s appointment that blocked him from getting a confirmation vote.

The move was unprecedented for a high-level cabinet nominee and came just little more than a month after Democrats and Republicans reached that filibuster reform deal.
......

As leverage, Republican leaders have stressed that things could change in 2014 and the Democrats could lose big if they kill the filibuster and become the new minority party in the Senate.

The theory is that historically, the party that has won the White House and controlled the Senate fares poorly in midterm elections, and it could be the Democrats that benefit in the long run from rules that give a minority party the power of the filibuster.

Reid has been a staunch supporter of keeping the filibuster and has brokered deals before to keep it in place.
......

Why the constitutional option on the filibuster matters

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Second Amendment Harry Reid Moves to Destroy the Senate Rules that are Blocking Passage of Gun Control

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Second Amendment Harry Reid Moves to Destroy the Senate Rules that are Blocking Passage of Gun Control

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tulianr Don Quixote de la Monkey

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