The Glade 4.0

all up in this ****...no thread?

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

How is this not stupid posturing? The Senate still needs to pass a 60-vote cloture motion to actually vote on any bill regardless, doesn't it?

No. Cloture is specifically for ending filibuster.

As for "posturing," I find the dismissiveness hilarious. To quote Elmo's FB tweet:

"Perplexing that #RandPaul has to do this filibuster to ask a Nobel Peace Prize winner if he agrees with killing U.S. citizens without trial."

You're just used to cloture being common, OR you're used to a virtual filibuster. As mentioned in another thread, politics is a different animal with different rules. Doing a real filibuster makes a statement.


So tell me, are you defending the administration's stance on targeting killings?

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

Remember, Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize for the things he might do. One could posit that this bill exists purely so that Obama can overturn it and finally earn that Nobel Peace Prize he won four years ago.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

I must also interject, on a purely juvenile level, that I'm delighted that Joe Heisman, The Godfather, Patton, Henry Vth, Jay-Z, and Stephen Segal have all been invoked by name or by quote on the floor of the Senate, now.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

I can see how you put Joe Heisman, The Godfather, Patton, Henry V, and Jay-Z together, but where does Stephen Segal fit in there?

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I don't remember if it was Paul or one of the other senators in the course of their question, but they were quoting, I think it was a Wired article, on drones, and there was the line "or, as Stephen Segal would say, 'Marked for Death'" in there.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Stephen Segal taught the best fighter on the planet how to do the kick that got him one of the best knockouts of his career. He's alright.

I was going to but I combined it with the drone thread.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

No, I actually thought the filibuster mentioned in the original post was one about the budget/spending, because I could've sworn I read something to the effect that one was planned on CNN at some point. Since passing a spending bill in the Senate would require 60 votes anyway, actually filibustering it would be kind of pointless.

EDIT: Now that I've found what the filibuster is actually about, (CNN and MSNBC didn't even post it) I'm still not sure it's not just posturing. He's filibustering Obama's cabinet nominee, doesn't this confirmation also require 60 votes to make it to the floor for a vote? If the other side has the votes to confirm him, they certainly have the votes to stop the filibuster.

obviously not or they would? or they don't?

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

No. You only need 60 votes for cloture. Cloture is used to cease debate. Debate is used to filibuster. Otherwise, for most normal functions of the Senate, 50%+1 wins.

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

Yes, but the rules were changed in the early 90s in the Senate that ALL bills must pass a cloture vote to be brought to the floor for an actual vote, regardless of whether or not a filibuster is occurring. It's not just used to end filibusters. Unless it was recently changed back, NO bill can be voted on without passing a cloture vote as part of procedure, effectively requiring 60 votes for passage of anything and making filibusters very pointless.

His method may be, but I think Paul's made his point quite well. He wants the executive branch to say they won't use drone strikes against US citizens on US soil, then you can have the CIA director of your choice. However for some reason they won't do it.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

Um, do you have some sort of source for this?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloture#United_States

Doesn't mention anything about being required 100% of the time. Further research disproves your assertion as well.

Cloture forces an end to debate.



Regardless, it seems you side with the administration on this issue.

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

I found some links on Google, however most of these sites are pretty biased, so I think you'll lend more credence to the fact that Khross has mentioned this several times on the board before.

As to where I stand, I'm also going to go with "it depends." I suspect the bar I would use is much higher than what Obama's administration would use, but I can't read their minds and figure out what their "standards" are. It's just dumb to publicly declare that you can never do it for any reason, there are always possible (if extremely improbable or far-fetched) situations where it would be acceptable.

There's an 'actual filibuster' and the 'procedural filibuster', the latter of which was introduced to Congress by Democrats during the Civil Rights Era. Effectively, you need 60 votes on any bill to end debate; these are the actual cloture changes, of which DFK! is aware and understands. He's also aware that because of the fractious and public nature of our political theatre, that this 60 vote limit is used for all sorts of propaganda purposes, not the least of which is accusing Senators of changing their positions. Rand Paul's filibuster is a filibuster; the Senate has enough votes without issue to end debate on the nomination/confirmation of the director of the CIA. Consequently, Rand Paul is gong to keep talking until they can't vote or won't vote. That's an actual filibuster.

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