Georgia Senate Seat

My guess is that Democrats are not all that unhappy not to have 60 votes. Obama at least, and presumably the leadership as well, would rather have to have Republican votes than have the Republicans have an excuse to beg off taking a stand on risky legislation. 60 votes would have upped the ante on the Democrats being responsible for everything, and 58 or 59 votes are enough to ensure that very few filibusters will hold. What's your take on this, Karen?

Wait so are you saying that even after giving Joe Lieberman whatever he wanted the Democrats STILL don't have a guaranteed 60 votes? Im shocked, SHOCKED I tell ya.
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Prediction
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There will be some folks who will say "Obama cut a secret deal with Lieberman so McCain and Lindsey Graham will vote with him".
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To that I say
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BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA

sgwhite - Having campaigned for Saxby Champbliss as the person who would protect the country from the terrible liberal policies of Obama, the Republicans will be hard pressed to explain to their constituencies why they were unable to stop Obama when it comes down to specifics.

KT
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Ben Nelson might as well be a republican when it comes to voting record. I want to see how Harry Reid keeps him in line now that Reid has shown that he is willing to buy people off for votes.

KT and SGW: The 60 vote super maj was a red herring. Ben Nelson and one or two others (Lieber?) can never be relied upon to vote in line. It will always come down to issues, and people like Collins and her colleague will be key to getting something through. I have little confidence in Harry Reid.

Given the recent past, I agree with Kathy.

The only reason at all that there's a 60 vote threshold in the Senate is that Harry Reid perpetually creates one. He does this by proposing and passing a rule specifying the vote requirement prior to the consideration of any legislation. He calls it "getting things done", of course. During the FISA capitulation debacle last year, this is the rule to which Chris Dodd objected prior to a vote, thus preventing Harry from easily blocking his (and Russ Feingold's) attempts to amend the bill the President wanted him to pass.

Oh well. The Senate was never meant to be a democratic institution, right?

bitterpill
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Now you know you and I see eye to eye on this one. Thats one of the biggest reasons I was pissed about the Lieberman deal. The 60 vote myth was always just that, a myth. Even Claire McCaskill who I am a big fan of, is a very conservative voter and can't always be counted on as a vote on contentious issues. Now if we had a stronger majority leader I would feel much more hopeful. But as it is I can see that next year is going to be a rocky road for the Dems

kathy
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I know we won't agree about impeaching Bush but I want to point out how all of the networks were talking about the Nixon tapes that were released yesterday and revealed just how crazy the man was and more of the illegal things he advocated. Now ask yourself a question, if Nixon had been impeached or at least brought up on charges and all of this stuff had come up way back then, do you really think that the people of this country would have been as easy to convince about WMDs? For that matter do you think Bush would have been as bold in subverting the Constitution as he has if he knew his azz might end up in jail? And if your answer to those questions are no, thats the strongest argument that I could ever make as to why Bush and Co need to be prosecuted when Obama gets in to office.

KT
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Wouldn't the biggest tool he has or one of the biggest tools for overcoming an obstructionist minority what you and I agree on about forcing a filibuster? That would be a show of power in my opinion because he would have to have support from the rest of the Dems. As I recall there was supposed to be a filibuster on FISA and we see how that turned out. As for keeping the rank and file in line, I guess he could give all the Blue Dogs an important committee chair since evidently is what he thinks will keep Lieberman in line. Hmmmm

Best campaign sign (seen in the background of a Washington Post photo yesterday):

"We're bringing Saxby back"

KT - It's because Reid will have trouble keeping all his Democrats together that I expect he's just as glad not to have 60 of them. Not as much pressure to do something he couldn't do anyway.
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sgwhite- I think our biggest point of disagreement about impeachment is whether it would be knocking heads against a brick wall to try to do anything. I just don't see any sign from anyone that Bush is going to be held accountable, and I think it's even less likely after he's out of office. Maybe 10 years from now, when the culture's really changed.
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This Bill Moyers interview with Bruce Fein and John Nichols pretty much sums up the argument for impeachment. If you didn't see it the first time around is definitely worth reading or listening to. If Bruce Fein could convince conservatives of the need to hold some of this crowd accountable after they're out of office it might happen. Otherwise I don't think it will. I don't disagree with you about the need. And I think the Obama could issue presidential findings that would give another president less wiggle room.
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http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/07132007/transcript2.html

Thomas Frank has an article at wsj on health care reform

I will reiterate my theory that Reid and Schumer were permitting the Republicans to win these "filibusters." By voting in a bloc against popular legislation, by linking themselves so closely to Bush, they were guaranteeing themselves electoral failure. If Gordon Smith had broken with the president after the 2006 elections, and strongly supported a withdrawal timeline, he would not have lost.
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We'll see. My prediction is that the republicans will find it much more difficult to just say "Oh, we filibuster." and have that stick. As Stuart says, when Reid wanted to break a filibuster, he did so.
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I also think it's going to be harder to hold a forty vote bloc with only, at most (Lieberman and Ben Nelson) four votes to spare.
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And, of course, things don't look good for Republicans in the Senate in 2010 either. One positive note for the Republicans in this session is that Martinez will not be feeling any voter pressure. But that's a shortlived benefit.

Oh, and sgwhite. I don't necessarily disagree with you, except to say that virtually every sitting member of Congress is old enough to remember what was going on with Nixon, and the fact is that Nixon was not impeached (though he would have been had he not resigned) and that reality makes it all the harder to hold Bush accountable. I think Bush was thoroughly convinced he was not breaking laws (and since he didn't know the law or, one would guess, the constitution, he had only his sycophantic, compliant minions to gauge the law by).

kathy
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Correct me if I am wrong but wouldnt an impeachment vote come from the House and there fore shouldn't it be pretty easy to do right now? I mean the truth is I believe that regardless of if he gets convicted in the Senate, the investigation itself would reveal enough to the American people so that they could make their own decisions and or it could lead to criminal charges other than the impeachment proceedings. There really is nothing stopping the Dems from impeaching him. Nothing except their lack of courage that is.

Off topic: a topic evidently off-limits (to the American press):

Kidnapped by the US government, shot, and tortured? Maybe, possibly, can't be? Who knows? No news is good news!

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,druck-593195,00.html

kathy
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Correct me if I am wrong but wouldnt an impeachment vote come from the House and there fore shouldn't it be pretty easy to do right now? I mean the truth is I believe that regardless of if he gets convicted in the Senate, the investigation itself would reveal enough to the American people so that they could make their own decisions and or it could lead to criminal charges other than the impeachment proceedings. There really is nothing stopping the Dems from impeaching him. Nothing except their lack of courage that is.

On impeachment, it's pointless without republican support. Nixon would have been fine if the Republicans of the time were bloc voting like the spineless Republicans of today.
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I know Reid, and the Democrats, get a lot of criticism, while the republican positions are sorta taken for granted. But the complete subjugation of institution to party is rare (I believe unprecedented) in American history. That, for example, Specter simply gave up his authority to the administration is not in the tradition and or consistent with the history of the Senate. The system was designed to (and has had the effect of) Senators sitting after the end of presidential terms.
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The complete absence of a Howard Baker or a Bill Cohen objecting to the administration flouting the will of Congress is what I believe historians will comment on.
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2 more things about impeachment

1. I find it totally incomprehensible that 8 years after impeaching a sitting President because he got oral sex from an intern, that impeachment for actual crimes that may have led to american deaths as well as breaking international law is somehow off limits or a moot point.

2. Nancy Pelosi should be using the threat of impeachment to stop Bush from issuing all of these orders at the end of his term trying to circumvent Congress to get his agenda put in place.

And kathy if Bush didn't know, he should have knows. That would be a weak azz excuse if he tried to use it.

sgwhite - No, it wouldn't be easy because Nancy Pelosi isn't going to do it. Also, as Obama made clear he believes, most of the country just wants to get beyond the Bush years. We have serious issues, and starting impeachment hearings is going to pull oxygen out of the system and make it harder for Obama to get his agenda passed. Right now he's got Republicans drooling over him.
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Did you watching Morning Joe? Joe was defending Bush's "legacy." Said future historians aren't going to see him necessarily as a great president, but...
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Impeaching Bill Clinton did not help the Republicans, and made it less likely impeachment will be used again any time soon.

Off topic{
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Bowers on Hardball: http://tinyurl.com/6nkuvp
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Chris was good. Yesterday, as I do occasionally, I checked to see what Wolf was shouting about. He had the usual centrist Democrat, right wing Republican in the strategy session thing, asking them what the left wing of the Democratic party thinks. Credit to Tweety for putting a leftleaning Democrat on instead.
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Chris conveyed the position that we are not seeing in the media (as on the front page of the NYT today, which has this:
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Mr. Obama evidently decided that nominating Mr. Brennan was not worth a battle with some of his most ardent supporters on the left.
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This is, of course, false. The people who rose up to document Brennan's record were people like Glenn Greenwald, who could not possibly be characterized as "ardent [Obama] supporters." This is part of a false narrative depicting Obama as having run much farther to the left than he actually did, and depicting his support as coming substantially from the left wing of the party, which is also not true. Part of this is hangover of anti-Iraq war=dirty hippie narrative, of using someone's position on the invasion and occupation as the only element to use when assigning a position on the political spectrum.

kathy
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I am talking about procedurally. Of course we don't have the leadership to get it done and thats a crying damm shame. Its the RESPONSIBILITY of the House of Representatives to impeach a President if its likely he has committed crimes. How it can be a selective thing is totally beyond me.
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"the President, Vice President, and all civil officers of the United States shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors."

Notice that even misdemeanors are mentioned. Now if the situation were reversed do you think the Republican's would think twice about impeaching a Democratic president if they were suspected of half the things Bush is suspected of doing? And you know what, in that case the Republicans would be right.
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How impeaching a president for getting head would prevent another president from being impeached for high crimes against he country is again, totally beyond me.
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We both know that Morning Joe is a propaganda show. Hell they had the CEO of one of the Big 3 on MSNBC and he laid out in plain terms the accountability the companies would have to have to not only get some money up front, but also to continue getting money in an auto bailout. That included hitting their sales numbers every month. And if they didn't not only could the Government hold back the rest of their money, they could also liquidate some of their assets to recoup the money they had already loaned out. But did Joe Scarborough or any of his cronies mention this? Of course not. Wait let me post the video from Jon Stewart comparing Joe to Alan Colmes.
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hilarious!

Congrats to those who can watch MO-U-RNING JOE and not puke. By the way you can find out everything you want to know about the Senate and its traditions by going to CSpan and watching the farewell for Porker in chief Stevens. His recent conviction did nothing to moderate the hosannahs. If a convcted felon (with an appeal pending) can get this treatment then you can draw your own conclusions about the Senate.