Filibuster: It is Time to Kill It

After what transpired in the Senate yesterday, getting Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson (D. Neb.), to agree to support that body's version of health care reform and prevent the expected filibuster by Republicans, it seems all too clear this legislative maneuver from a bygone era must finally be ended.

It is not in the Constitution and it blocks the will of the majority. It was originally instituted to block a so called tyranny of the majority and give voice to the minority party. It was intended to be used sparingly, in rare instances, rather than the tool threatened to be used (by that minority) party on every measure that is presented by a member from the majority.

It has become the constant threat, not only to prevent measures from reaching the floor for a vote but to exact compromises to suit particular members of the majority party that result in a gutting of any real reform legislation; in this case health care reform. As has been made all too clear, it is not just the threat from the Republican opposition who have been the intransigent obstructionists from the beginning of the health care debate, it is the Democrats' own "blue dog" members and Joe Lieberman,(I. Conn.) who have been the primary obstacles to bring a health care reform bill to the president. That Senate proposal is now littered with amendments that cater to these intraparty resisters and is nothing more than a bill of blackmail disguised as necessary compromise to get something, anything passed so it can be said we passed health care reform. In this instance that something , anything is the bastard of a health care "reform" bill the Senate is expected to pass before Christmas.

Not only does the Senate bill preclude a single payer, medicare type reform package that would truly reform health care and provide real competition to the current private health care monopoly that would reduce medical costs substantially, (this from an industry that is at the heart of why our private system is so dysfuctional, is so costly, exacts so much in overhead and placates their share holder's desire for dividend income that are realized from the outsized profits extorted through providers and policy holders charges and payments, has denied coverage and/or limits pre-existing conditions and is responsible for thousands of unnecessary deaths each year), there is no public option, the compromised government run program that would have provided some limited competition to the private health care behemoths. This bill will increase the latters monopoly stranglehold by requiring the many existing uninsureds to purchase some form of coverage from the private insurers.

The threat of filibuster has done this. For Democrats to lose any of their "filibuster proof" 60 votes would stop any measure in its tracks. The filibuster once required 66 votes for cloture, end debate and force a vote on the full floor. It was reduced to 60 in the 1970's. It has become a cancer masquerading as a needed crutch by the minority party ( and their "allies" on the other side of the aisle) to hold the majority hostage and prevent any real reform from taking place. It is time to kill it.

Views expressed on this page are those of the authors and not necessarily those of Campaign for America's Future or Institute for America's Future