I had heard that Senator Sinema (D-AZ) had argued that it’s important to keep the filibuster because it protects progressive laws, and I thought, Well, that’s stupid reasoning. But now I see a Professor David Super of Georgetown is making the same argument:
This perspective is remarkably shortsighted. Although the filibuster has blocked central parts of the Democratic program in recent years, it has done the same for key features of the Republican agenda, too. At a time when the Republican Party is becoming ever more extreme, and when other constraints on irresponsible action have fallen away, the filibuster is more important than ever as a tool to protect hard-won legislative gains of the civil rights, environmental and consumer revolutions. It is the filibuster alone that protects the Endangered Species Act, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the Legal Services Corp. [WaPo]
And this is convincing … how?
What is stopping the Republicans from killing the filibuster rule and enacting their desired legislation?
Their honor?
Or did the Democrats win the flip of the coin that decides who has dominion over the filibuster rule in this session of Congress?
Arguing on the basis of the status quo is a lost argument; there are variables at play here, and ascertaining them, their current values, and their resistance to change is key to building a realistic model of the situation. I think that the respect the Republicans have for their colleagues across the aisle, based on the comments of GOP leader Senator McConnell (R-KY), indicate that the filibuster’s predictable lifetime is now fairly short.
The question is whether the Democrats want to harvest the riches that may come of removing the filibuster, or, in the unfortunate instance of the Republicans taking the Senate back, it goes to the Republicans.
