…when I said that the only result would be a symbolic gesture towards ‘reform’ with no real changes.  It turns out that progressives didn’t even get that: their precious attempt to deny the Great Shellacking was quietly choked to death in a narrow, dusty room* Tuesday afternoon… and nothing was put in its place.  Tim Noah of Slate is kind of upset about it all –  which is kind of odd, considering that there was never a reasonable chance after November that the Democratic leadership would have made it easier to pass an Obamacare repeal bill.

Yes, that would have been the immediate result of this scheme.  Let me spell it out for those folks on the Other Side who are having difficulty following along (which apparently include some of their Senators).  When you control both Houses of Congress, but the opposition party has enough votes in the Senate to win cloture fights, you want filibuster ‘reform’ to make it easier to pass your legislation.  When you only control the Senate, the Senate opposition party wants filibuster ‘reform’ to make it easier to pass their legislation – particularly when it looks likely that the opposition party will be the majority party after the next election.

This is not particularly difficult to understand.  I’d say that I’m sorry that progressive politicians are too steeped in twinned warm delusions (first delusion, that progressives are popular; second delusion, that the November elections can be negated by an act of Will) to really comprehend this… except that I try not to lie to people.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

*Yeah, that’s a G.K. Chesterton reference.  Because that’s how I roll.