Peter d’Errico’s blog

Elizabeth Drew’s analysis of Obama’s 30 days [New York Review of Books, March 26] repeats the conventional, misguided, self-defeating notion that the Senate cannot do anything significant without 60 votes, “to ward off a filibuster, or even the threat of one.” To the contrary, perhaps the most significant action the Senate might now take is to call the Republicans’ bluff and let them go forward with a filibuster.

Please note: If Democrats had insisted on real filibusters at several junctures during the past several months they have been in the majority, instead of giving in after failing to round up cloture votes beforehand, Republicans would have been forced to display — in public on the floor of the Senate — their obstruction to Medicare financing, as well as to funding to combat AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis. Harry Reid had cots brought into the Senate for an all-night session in July when Republicans started to filibuster the Iraq pullout bill, but he caved when the first cloture vote was lost.

As I have written before: What is the reluctance of the Democratic majority to call the bluff of Republicans and force them to follow through on threatened filibusters? Is it cowardice, ineptness, or laziness? Rounding up cloture votes to forestall a filibuster is not the same as actually tackling a filibuster. It is ‘filibuster lite’ and the cloture vote becomes a virtual vote, empowering the minority rather than overwhelming it. As a result, Congress becomes ever more opaque and Americans become ever more suspicious of the legislative process.

In 1964, segregationist senators held up Senate business for 57 days, filibustering against the Civil Rights Act. Their filibuster revealed to America the mindset of the obstructionists and paved the way for successful actual cloture and passage of the Act. The civil rights filibuster educated people about the historic struggle and the landmark legislation. A writer analyzing the process of the Senate ought to be familiar with this history. A progressive writer today ought to understand the significance and the necessity of calling the right-wing obstructionists to account for themselves.

David RePass (emeritus professor of political science at the University of Connecticut), “Make My Filibuster,” [Op-Ed, New York Times, 1 March] used the phrase “phantom filibuster” to make the same point:

It also happens to make a great deal of political sense for the Democrats to force the Republicans to take the Senate floor and show voters that they oppose Mr. Obama’s initiatives. If the Republicans want to publicly block a popular president who is trying to resolve major problems, let them do it. And if the Republicans feel that the basic principles they believe in are worth standing up for, let them exercise their minority rights with an actual filibuster.

[ported from my Facebook profile]

Obama has to show his street organizer talents as soon as he is inaugurated. If he goes along to get along with business as usual, he will forfeit his powers to change. The first days are the most important because they are the moments of greatest anticipation. Expectation on all sides is an opportunity for new directions. The voices of moderation are — as MLK, Jr., pointed out years ago — invitations to do nothing, to preserve the status quo. You can hear those voices murmuring, “America is a center-right nation. Change is not what we really want.”

In October, speaking to Native American Indians via video, Barack’s Message for First Americans , Barack said “We’ve got to acknowledge that truth [the tragic history between the United States and Tribal Nations] if we’re going to move forward in a fair and honest way.” This principle of understanding history applies not just to working with Native Nations of America, but across the whole range of issues, conflicts, and crises confronting us as Peoples on a Planet.

Barack said, too, “I know what it feels like to be viewed as an outsider sometimes. I know what it’s like to have not always been respected, to sometimes have been ignored.”

It remains to be seen if he will act in accord with these statements on a global basis. In particular, will Barack Obama lead the U.S. government to acknowledge and respect all the Peoples of the Middle East, or will he continue to insist there is a “special relationship” with one of them? The “tragic history” of Jewish relations with virtually all Western governments must be acknowledged, but it is not an excuse for more tragedy.

The United States is often referred to as a “Christian country” (and there is a sense in which this is true, given the historical trajectory of Christian-inspired colonization in North America). But the United States takes upon itself the support of a Jewish state in the Middle East, as part of a political trajectory derived from ejection of Jews by European states during and after WW II. Meanwhile, the U.S. relates to Muslim states primarily through colonial and neo-colonial trade structures. All of this elaborate religio-political structure is coming apart at the seams. Relations with the “heathen” Indians included.

We need to acknowledge the whole long story of the Family of Abraham if we’re going to move forward in a fair and honest way. We must stand back to see the underlying cultural-genealogical connections among Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Peoples to understand their motivations to fight one another to the death. That means standing back from whatever allegiances we ourselves may have to one or another version or participant in that Family history. Undoubtedly this is asking for a lot, especially in an era where introspection is guarded against by culture leaders as well as the masses whose energies they direct.

It is not necessary to have much introspection and understanding of others (and otherhood) to take a stand against the present carnage. But deep understanding of the big picture is essential to survival of diverse Peoples on a single Planet. If Barack sees this and acts on it with all Nations, as he promised to with Native American Nations, he will have a chance to be a great leader. If he waits, bides his time for some other opportunity, he will have already defaulted on his great mantra of change and will lose his chance of leading anywhere.

I feel like I can breathe again. My life seems richer with meaning and purpose. I no longer feel like an alien or wonder if there’s somewhere to escape from an insane regime. I sense opportunities for our generation — to be root children for the current crop of flower children. We looked at all these things 40 years ago: energy, food, war, peace, environment, fairness, justice, equality, gender, etc., etc.; but we were naive and had no mentors aside from ideological stuff of the Old left. We are now Old left, but no longer left over. I like it. We are experiencing a rush of generalized euphoria, in cafes, on the street, everywhere. And we hear ourselves in conversations about how much there is to fix and how it will take lots of work and time. I am happy to see positive responses from around the world: a much speedier rehabilitation of America’s image than I anticipated. We have done something great. Now we have to leap into the breach and keep O’s team’s feet to the fire of progressive change. The right will do all it can to dampen and extinguish this, to arouse a sense of impossibility and unadvisability, to assert and sustain a concept of America as a center-right country. Our every conversation counts.

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A note from a colleague at Columbia University:

over our heads here in work but obsessing wildly on the news. waited 45 years for this. obama already looking centrist, but hell so was jfk. my friends in indonesia and france and japan and holland and elsewhere are elated. so am i. the kids are completely invested in this. my students can’t remember anything other than bush. like waking up from a nightmare for them only that now they see that they were in deep denial like just about everybody else. i’m glad jewish americans went for obama by 77%. that’s healing, still, more whites voted for mcpain than o. manhattan was 85% o. everyone is smiling at everyone, a sensation of connection, like after 9/11 but without the sadness. on the subway platform last night alice and i waited for a train and a young woman leans over to see if there’s a train coming and turns to us smiling and alice asks “Is there a train coming?” and the girl says “no, i’m just smiling because obama won!” she was white. and earlier yesterday morning, there was a plumber working in the hallway of our building and when i entered he smiled and said “great election!” and i said “yeah, the best in my lifetime since jfk, actually even better than that.” and we spontaneously shook hands. he was black. so there’s a hypersensitivity now to class positions and interconnectedness all of a sudden, just as fast as “world opinion” has changed. like my friend in paris said, 97% french wanted obama for president (pause, then, “in the u.s., not in france…”) so now we see prospects of lawrence summers. please spare me for the time being. at least everyone is talking about politics now. overheard by a cellphoner on broadway yesterday, “hey, he’s not gonna take care of the world’s problems in 13 hours” and “i told my mamma, just because he’s black doesn’t mean i’m gonna make more” and on and on. people are talking. like the old greek waitresses in tom’s diner where alice and i’ve eaten for the last 8 years, like suddenly they’re quoting headlines in greece (and greek) saying obama’s the “president of the planet” and looking at me and saying do you think he’s gonna be able to do anything. and that’s a good question. at least now there are questions.

Connie Bruck’s review of Chuck Hagel in The New Yorker — “The Political Scene: Odd Man Out” (November 3, 2008) misses a significant detail: the Sunni Awakening is a function of American payments, not an autonomous Iraqi response to the troop ‘surge.’ Bush-league Republicanism wants to hide this straightforward payoff scheme from its lumpen base. “We pay them not to shoot at us” sounds an awful lot like coddling criminals by handing out welfare checks — a double whammy for any self-respecting redneck. I’m sure Hagel is not fooled.

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“They [are] paid roughly $300 a month by the United States to guard checkpoints and buildings and — for those who used to be insurgents — to no longer blow up American convoys and shoot American troops.” “Awakening Movement in Iraq,” New York Times (September 22, 2008)

Unquestioning and unthinking support of John Kerry is the message of bloggers who repeatedly flog Ed O’Reilly for telling The Boston Globe that Kerry ought to go ahead and clear up questions about his military credentials after Kerry himself announced he was prepared to do that very thing.

Here’s the story timeline: Kerry’s military record is attacked by the so-called Swift Boaters for Truth, a Republican shill group in the 2004 election. Kerry fails to respond clearly and forcefully. Questions remain. Kerry is interviewed by the Plymouth, MA, newspaper in November 2007, and says he is contemplating another run for the presidency in 2012 and has compiled a dossier to refute the Swift Boat attacks. Boone Pickens, financier of the Republican attackers, picks up the challenge, calls Kerry’s bluff, and offers a $1million prize. Kerry is on the hook. The Boston Globe calls Ed O’Reilly and asks his opinion. O’Reilly says Kerry ought to clear up the remaining questions and put this festering controversy behind him. Immediately O’Reilly is criticized in DailyKos and Blue Mass Group as being a “Republican sympathizer,” adopting “Republican talking points.”

Very strange: When O’Reilly says that Kerry ought to go ahead and clear up the questions, O’Reilly is attacked for acknowledging that there are questions, despite the fact that Kerry himself says he has answers to the questions that the bloggers say don’t exist. The Berkshire Eagle presented the contradiction in its most obvious form, saying that John Kerry should “clear up the questions” about his military service while criticizing Ed O’Reilly for saying exactly the same thing. What kind of illogic is that? Kerry should “clear up the questions,” but O’Reilly should not say so?

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Note: The Berkshire Eagle has taken down the link to it’s editorial on this. The link — http://www.berkshireeagle.com/editorials/ci_7546587 — now goes to a page titled “Sink Swift Boat Issue,” with the statement “the article … is no longer available.”

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One more thing, in case you have any doubt: The elevation of military experience (or pretend military experience, as in the case of George Bush) as a political qualification deserves to be questioned in its own right. Politicians who claim military experience are twice-burdened: once to explain why war is a sign of leadership in a democratic society, and twice to explain their own experience. In this context, Bush’s ‘military record’ is far more outrageously questionable than Kerry’s. But the fact that Bush is a fraud does not relieve Kerry of these burdens.

If Massachusetts Democratic Primary challenger Ed O’Reilly has a chance to debate incumbent John Kerry, we’ll learn that Kerry is not a Massachusetts Democrat! That’s what’s motivating Kerry’s avoidance of debates.

On every major issue, John Kerry fails to uphold MA Democratic platform and principles. Here’s a quick summary:

1) Single-Payer Health Care: The Democratic Party gave the country the original single payer systems: Medicaid, Medicare, and the Veterans Health Administration. Massachusetts Democrats continue to advocate for a single payer health system for all citizens. Party Platform

Ed O’Reilly supports single-payer and would sponsor a Senate companion bill to John Conyers’ House bill. John Kerry does not support single-payer and calls for building up the current public/private system (A Call to Service, by John Kerry, p.125-9, Oct 1, 2003), a position he affirmed in 2006 and 2007 in a statement entitled “Health care for all Americans”:

What I put forward in 2004 works. It was a good plan then, and it’s a good plan now.

The URL for this statement http://www.johnkerry.com/2006/7/31/health-care-for-all-americans is now redirected to the Kerry home page. This change happened shortly after O’Reilly’s website criticized Kerry’s opposition to single-payer last year.

2) Withdrawal from Iraq: The Massachusetts Democratic Party supports the withdrawal of all U.S. Armed Forces, contractors and sub-contractors; closing of bases; reorganization of reconstruction activities; promotion of a United Nations-led peacekeeping mission; and limiting of U.S. funding to withdrawal and consultations with the Iraqi Government and other governments. Party Resolution

Ed O’Reilly supports the MA Dem position. John Kerry enabled the Iraq invasion, then waffled as he tried to catch up to polls against the war. He continues to waffle on related issues: for example — troop leave-time and maximum deployment; Iran policy.

3) Marriage Equality: MA Dems affirm a commitment to the Massachusetts constitutional guarantee to same-sex marriage; and all of its rights, privileges and obligations; and reject any attempt to weaken or revoke those rights. Platform

Ed O’Reilly is a firm supporter of marriage equality. John Kerry said the MA Dem commitment to marriage equality was a mistake.

4) Fair Taxes: The MA Dem Platform supports tax equity. Platform

Ed O’Reilly strongly criticized the Democratic failure to close the hedge fund tax loophole in 2007. John Kerry refused to support closing the hedge fund tax loophole, suggesting the hedge funds be given a ten-year grace period before the loophole is closed:

According to one lobbyist (who doesn’t work for the firms), two prominent Boston-based firms that are members of the Private Equity Council–Bain Capital Private Equity and Thomas H. Lee Partners–have been lobbying Kerry hard on the issue. Moreover, FEC data indicate that not long after closing the loophole was first proposed back in April, a number of Bain private equity partners started to make big contributions to Kerry. Partners Josh Bekenstein, Diane Exter and Jonathan Lavine have all given in excess of $4,000 each to the Kerry Senate campaign fund. Bain’s mananging director, Mark Nunnelly, and two staffers have also all maxed out to Kerry this cycle with $4,600 each to his Senate campaign.

Paul Krugman’s column, “Kennedy’s Big Day” (NYTimes July 11, 2008), says “Democrats failed by one vote to override a Republican filibuster” last month. He follows this by saying “Democratic leaders decided to play brinkmanship” by letting the doctors’ cuts stand, exposing Senators to “intense lobbying.”

Please note: If Democrats had insisted on a real filibuster last month, instead of giving in after failing to round up cloture votes beforehand, Republicans would have been forced to display their obstruction to Medicare financing in public on the floor of the Senate.

I remember when segregationist senators held up Senate business for 57 days in 1964, filibustering against the Civil Rights Act. The filibuster revealed to America the mindset of the obstructionists and paved the way for successful actual cloture and passage of the Act. The filibuster educated people, though not in the direction hoped-for by the segregationists.

A Times editorial last autumn, “In Search of a Congress” (September 21, 2007), called for real filibusters as a way for Congress to do “what it is supposed to do: debate profound issues like [the Iraq war] and take a stand.”

Despite that editorial, The Times failed in a recent editorial ["Republican Delay on AIDS" (July 7, 2008)] to castigate the Democratic leadership’s refusal to call the bluff of filibuster threats. Democrats did not insist on a real filibuster, which would have forced Republicans to argue in public on the floor of the Senate against funding to combat AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis, displaying their obstructionism to the American people.

What is the reluctance of the Democratic majority to call the bluff of Republicans and force them to follow through on threatened filibusters? Is it cowardice, ineptness, or laziness? Rounding up cloture votes to forestall a filibuster is not the same as actually tackling a filibuster. It is ‘filibuster lite’ and the cloture vote is a virtual vote. As a result, Congress becomes ever more opaque and Americans become ever more suspicious of the legislative process.

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Addendum: “Democrats Try to Break Grip of the Senate’s Dr. No” (NYTimes, 28 July 2008):

At least one senator knows how to use the rules! He’s a Republican focused on budget issues. His critics say he is obstructing the way the Senate usually works, which “is known as unanimous consent, an agreement among all parties to let a bill pass without a fight since full debate and votes on even the simplest matter can consume days.” He says, “I am not a go-along, get-along guy if I think it is the wrong way to go. … I am O.K. taking the consternation of my colleagues. I take my oath seriously.”

Wow! Imagine if there were one senator who was so intent on stopping the neo-con agenda! Imagine the effect of forcing the Senate to vote and debate!