Mike Flynn @ Breitbart:
On Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid pushed back a vote to confirm Richard Cordray until July. President Obama recess appointed Cordray to head the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and needs to be permanently confirmed by the Senate. Senate GOP have blocked confirmation until serious reform of the over-arching new agency is undertaken. The delay in the vote suggests Reid is setting up a summer fight on eliminating the filibuster for Presidential nominations.
A Senate Democrat aide told The Huffington Post that the “plan is to wait until immigration is complete before engaging in total all-out nom[ination] fight.” A July fight over nominations would come, presumably, after immigration but before the budget battles expected this fall.
Reid’s plan is to change the Rules of the Senate to provide that judicial and Executive Branch nominations are approved by a simple majority vote. Senate Rules themselves can be changed by a simple majority, so Reid just needs 51 of his 55 caucus members to eliminate the filibuster.
On Wednesday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell angrily denounced the potential move. “These continued threats to use the nuclear option point to the Majority’s own culture of intimidation here in the Senate,” McConnell said.
“Their view is that you had better confirm the people we want, when we want them, or we’ll break the rules of the Senate to change the rules so you can’t stop us. So much for respecting the rights of the minority. So much for a meaningful application of Advice and Consent.”
Anyone with an iota of reasonable intellect and a smidgen of political literacy has to question if Mitch actually believes his own words. Much like bringing senatorial dysfunction to an entirely new level, Mitch brings his hypocrisy to an all-time high as well.
This has nothing in the world to do with Democrats being bitter about not getting what they want “any time they want”. It’s about an uncompromising GOP that has unprecedentedly filibustered appointees, not to mention any and every legislation proposed by the White House-even the ones they like. And this issue isn’t limited to the appointee’s qualifications, ideologies, or even political parties. In the case of the NRLB and the EPA, their objective is to render these agencies useless. That simply goes beyond the “so much for respecting the rights of the minority”.
The GOP has been given opportunity after opportunity to work with Democrats and they continue to refuse. Obviously, Democrats, much like most Americans, have simply run out of patience. But more importantly, the need for the senate and government agencies to function has become paramount and it’s obvious that Republicans in power aren’t about to let that happen. The argument that this will create friction in legislating is simply asinine. You simply cannot create more resistance than the GOP already has. And the fear of setting a precedent for the GOP to abuse should they regain power is also unfounded. They were ready in 2005 to change the rules and there was no comparison of what’s going on today. Considering how radical today’s GOP has become, if you think they wouldn’t change them for any minute reason, well, I have a few surplus Abram tanks that the Army doesn’t want or need to sell you.
Ronald J. Ward
yes the GOP are preventing that nomination,
because they see clearly the abuse of nomination not necessary to the mechanic
of the GOVERNMENT, there is always nominations and never improvement,
for THE PEOPLE to benefit , like FINDING JOBS REMEMBER?
all those nominated are not really what is needed in this COMMUNIST GOVERNMENT,
they just are copycat repeating the same talk of the leadership,
who are too lazy to do their own work,
don’t cry for any refuse nominations, the PEOPLE won’t notice a bit,
they are paying the GOVERNMENT to be RELIABLE,
it appears not so,
and THE PEOPLE ARE WASTING MONEY ON AN OVERLOAD OF NOMINY WHO CANNOT FUNCTION BY THEMSELVES WITHOUT DOING MISTAKES VERY COSTLY FOR THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE THE GOVERNMENT MULTI TRILLIONS TO PAY,
no SIR, instead of nomination they should delegate and reduce to a minimum of HALF the GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES and REDUCE THE PAY LOAD OF THAT HALF LEFT BY ONE THIRD,
and remove the USELESS LEADER out of the WHITE HOUSE with his CREW,
and get rid of all the UNION which is unnecessary in GOVERNMENT JOBS,
that will be just a start to get AMERICA on the road to A RECOVERY,
and please the GOPS
best to you.