Jonathan Bernstein notes today that although filibuster reform has technically given Democrats the ability to confirm any executive branch appointment, in practice Republicans can still tie up the Senate by insisting on lengthy parliamentary delays for every nominee. And that’s what they’re doing:
Senate Republicans continue to impose an across-the-board virtual hold on every executive branch nomination….Republican foot-dragging has created a backlog of more than 100 nominees, almost none of whom are controversial, and some of whom have been waiting since January for Senate floor action.
….I understand that Republicans are upset about the Democrats’ filibuster reform. It has robbed them of leverage over nominations — even if it’s entirely their own fault for having abused that leverage. But Republicans aren’t harming Senate majority leader Harry Reid by blocking nominations. They’re harming the functioning of the U.S. government. (Perhaps it might be nice to have ambassadors appointed in a few important nations?) And they are needlessly, cruelly, messing with people’s lives. On top of all that, they’re eliminating the leverage of individual Senators. As Ted Cruz (maybe) just learned, there’s no point putting an individual hold on a nomination that is already being held up by the entire Republican caucus.
And why? For the sake, as far as I can tell, of a tantrum.
Pretty much. But this is what they’ve been doing all along. The point of filibustering everything and everyone has never been just to prevent a few objectionable candidates from being confirmed. It’s been to tie up Senate floor time and disrupt even the routine functioning of a federal government that’s under Democratic control. Even with filibuster reform they can still do that, so why should they stop now? A broken government is nothing but good news for Republicans.
Bernstein says in another post today that he’s tired of hearing about political polarization. It’s not really anything new, after all. That’s true enough, and this is a good example. It’s not a case of polarization, it’s just a straightforward case of assholery. There’s no principle or ideology behind this, they’re merely causing dysfunction for the sake of causing dysfunction. Welcome to the modern GOP.
