The Filibuster Be Damned!

I have already written exhaustive rants about the filibuster, so I will keep this one short. There was a time when I felt emphatically that the filibuster had to remain as a defining element of Senate debate, as it has been an effective tool in keeping the Senate from passing truly heinous laws based on whatever particular craziness seemed to leap out of nowhere and grip the popular majority for a time before running its due course and returning to sanity. With the House, we get all kinds of super kooky bills that have been backed a majority of members and then killed (most often secretly) by this or that Senator that didn't poo poo publicly the House's legislation, which was the Congressional equivalent of a drunk text, but instead would send a nice handwritten note or while deliberating great deliberations in the world's greatest deliberative body would take a moment, perhaps over a nice cup of tea, and sidle to the Senate Majority Leader's desk, tap the House Bill, written out in an elegant hand, and then would shake his head ever so slightly. He would then move on to make a congenial jab at an old Princeton chum from across the aisle before returning to his chair, feeling proud of his tact and poise, something the barbarians in the House simply would understand (comportment! please!). Then he would congratulate himself for staving off another disaster and all before he drank his morning tea.

But don't be fooled, every now and again one of great lions would shake the dust and crumpet crumbs from his great mane, climb to the front of the room and roar. It was unthinkable before the 1980s to indicate that you would filibuster, and then when challenged, meekly step aside. No! You knew that every now and again, the cause of the moment was sometimes taken up by a dangerous majority of the Senate, and it was now not only a point of taste but a point of honor that you should enter into this contest of wills alongside your like-minded and right-minded colleagues and roar down those that challenged your power. And roar they did. Why Strom Thurmond (no lion was he...more like a sickly leopard) proved that he was made of the stuff of which Senators from ancient days had been hewn, when he spoke for 24 hours and 18 minutes straight in his attempt to derail the Civil Rights Act!

But one by one the old Senators fell away until only the greatest of the last generation of gentleman senators, the grandmaster of the Senate Robert C. Byrd, remained. Now he too has passed. But long before he took his final rest, as the others were replaced by the Congressional equivalent of new money Senators, the filibuster, which was made great by the risk that you would actually, in rare instances, take the podium, became instead a veto pen wielded by exactly 100 legislatures, each of whom thinks of him or herself as a petty monarch at best or a Grand Duchess at worst.

Well fie I say! FIE! What I once believed to be an integral part of the Senate and the safeguard of the legislative process has now become, instead of a proceed with caution/dangerous roads ahead sign,there is now a stop sign and a checkpoint that makes the Berlin Wall look like it was made out of legos and guarded by Rainbow Brite and those creepy little star creatures.

To Hell with the filibuster! Let America do as the rest of practicing democracies do...pass legislation with a 50% majority (or now again 2/3rd as may be called for by those greatest of all procedural guidelines, Robert's Rules of Order aka my personal Bible). And, just in other countries, when we realized we passed some crazy bullshit, have the House Speaker and the Senate Majority Leader keep calling Congress into session until the ubercrazies take their meds and start talkin' sense again.

Damn...that was a long as rant. I believe it shall be my blog of the

Yes We Can?: Only If You Shut the Fuck Up and Do Something

I still believe yes we can.

But only if "we" shut the fuck up, recognize that we have seen amazing progress, and recognize that we gave the president four a year term.

Unfortunately, it seems the only message that got across to the majority of Americans was "change." Once again this proves that there are three year olds with longer attention spans and cognitive abilities than the bulk of the American voting public.

Change is good if there is a strategic reason for change. Changing because you are angry, impatient, and haven't done anything to be part of a solution is selfish and damaging, and the fools that participated in this "change," are going to get exactly what they deserve. They are going to get even more polarization, ridiculous obstructionism (do I have to remind people that Mitch McConnell, Senate Minority Leader, openly declare in August that his ONLY goal in the Senate was to deny Obama a second term? Don't you people FUCKING LISTEN OR PAY ATTENTION!), and gridlock. What that means is that working people, poor people, the self-hating/racist/too stupid to think critically elder white men that turned out to vote, queer folks, women, and anyone else that is not secure enough in their personal wealth to be unaffected will find themselves worse off than they were at the end of 2008. Mark my words that these same individuals, including gutless/stupid/selfish/cry baby gays that have been been throwing tantrums and pity parties because Obama didn't put their pet issues first (WE ELECTED HIM TO A FOUR YEAR TURN--SHUT THE FUCK UP AND GO SUCK ON A THE TIT OF SOMEONE AT HRC!), are going to be all "shocked" and dismayed that they voted for this new Republican House, which really couldn't give a shit about anyone but themselves, that is not only ineffective but is going to act as a rubber stamp roadblock of legislation that could make a difference in this country.


I voted for change in 2008 when I cast my vote for Obama. By strategically thinking about my vote and what it meant, I have gotten much of what I wanted (though by no means all). I wanted universal health care, Obama fell short but we have the first health care reform bill basically EVER in this country...every President since Teddy Roosevelt has been trying to do what Obama has done and failed. I wanted the recession to end. Though the economy is growing slowly, it is growing. I wanted a massive slap down and regulation of Wall Street. Obama fell short, but he still managed to have passed a significant financial regulation reform including the creation of a Consumer Protection agency with significant powers to regulate Wall Street. There are still many more things that I want: job growth, end the wars, non-draconian immigrant positive legislation, passage of the DREAM Act, a package of queer liberation bills that can include the hetero-normative largely bullshit issues of HRC queers but queer positive immigration reform, 50 billion dollar investment in HIV/AIDS prevention/support for positives/cure research as well as a bill to de-criminalize HIV transmission and a ban on states that attempt to do so except in cases of willful malicious intent, student loan forgiveness for ANY college graduate that spends at least 5 years working for a non-profit organization in a service capacity, a infrastructure and transportation bill that drops half a trillion dollars into updating all aspects of our infrastructure and the construction of high speed rail lines all across the United States linking at least one major city in every U.S. State (of course, except Hawaii and Alaska).

I may not get all that I want, but I elected Obama to a four year term...expecting that he is going to do everything I want in two years is not only stupid and selfish but is unfair. The man was given four years to do the best he could for America, yet after only two years (which have seen amazing progress), folks are screaming ME ME ME ME MINE MINE MINE MINE NOW NOW NOW NOW. And let me be really clear with those of you that are feeling good and patting yourselves on the back because you did your once every two years duty to turn out and cast a ballot but in between elections you don't do anything except complain: FUCK YOU. FUCK YOU. FUCK YOU.

Was that message clear enough?

I have reached an end with those that believe that voting is their one and only civic responsibility when it comes to engaging with the political process. They cast a vote for a person and then heap all of their wants, desires, and expectations on that person. Basically, they abdicate person responsibility to advocate, actively, for change onto another person and then have the audacity to be angry when that person, staggering under the enormous piles of demands from all sides, picks a path that is shiny and lined with gold. if you are broke, of color, queer, disabled, or a woman and you don't, every day, do something small to create positive social change in this world, please know that the other side, with their massive wealth and deep pockets, can pave the way to their desires with gold bricks. It's up to the rest of us to make sure that those bricks are revealed as fools gold and that the field the path walks through is seeded with land mines.


The whole damn country needs a good old fashion ass-whooping and grounding. And, just like when I got a spanking when I was young, these voters deserve exactly what is coming to them.