Democratic Solution To The Filibuster: Make Them Talk

[JDPriestly]

18. No. To move Congress, we have to make sure that

members of Congress are held responsible to the public for their negative, delaying filibuster.

Requiring filibustering senators to stand up and talk until they can't talk any more, to require them to explain their opposition to the laws that are supported by the majority would help speed up the processes in Congress.

It also might help insure that members of Congress are really physically and mentally fit to serve. I remember back when the filibuster meant that people stayed up and talked on the floor of the Senate all night. The filibustering senators had to invest some energy in time in doing that and were much more inclined to compromise.

I support returning to the full filibuster. It would actually improve representation in Congress because constituents would have a chance to judge for themselves whether their senators were just being obstructive as a sort of gamesmanship or whether the issues they were debating were really worth the trouble.

Remember, we pay these obstructionist senators not only to just do nothing themselves at times on important matters but to force the rest of the Senate to stop their work on certain bills. Sometimes the filibusters really are necessary. But most of the time the Senators of the Party of No idly gain their paychecks. One thing we would all agree on: Democrats and Republicans work hard to earn the money that they pay in taxes. In the real world, our bosses make sure we work hard. We forget this, but we are the bosses of our Senators. We might as well make them work, visibly work, as hard as all those Walmart and other employees of big, greedy companies do.

I'm for the spoken, standing, suffering filibuster. Make the obstructionists earn their money. They are wasting ours with their negativity. And sometimes the public learns something from the filibustering folks. I wish someone had filibustered the resolution that permitted us to get into the Iraq War.