since I heard the news yesterday.

Seems too easy.

The Capitol police will arrest a Senator and literally drag him onto the floor (See Bob Packwood in the 80s).

And who suggests the absence of a quorum? One of the Republicans? Or a Democrat who then races out of the room?

How do endangered Senators run in red states (for months) with the police after them?

The only good news in this post is that some have entered the bargaining phase.

They just need to find a single Democrat... and they have the force of law behind them. Attendance is not optional. The Capitol Police will literally drag a Senator into the floor. It has happened:

The real reason it won't work is because there has to be someone on the floor to do a quorum call. That'd take a democrat. If he's there for the call, they're at 51. Now, if you could get Flake or someone to cooperate...

Doesn't sound like many Democrats would win in red states in that scenario.

And then when they're ready... McCain shows up to be the hero... or he retires and gets replaced and they suddenly have a quorum.

Then... with a quorum and no Democrats around, they ask for unanimous consent to push forward everything we've been blocking by failing to give it up until now.

IOW - there's no way this works.

being dragged to the floor wouldnt go over well in this climate. I dont think that would happen.

But as I said above and below - that's hardly the only thing keeping this from happening. The Senate presumes a quorum unless a Senator suggests the absence of one. Since no Republican would do so, that means one Democratic Senator has to stay on the floor... at which time the absence of McCain no longer busts the quorum.

Then there's the fact that McCain COULD show up... or he could quietly retire and be replaced with someone who would show up.

Then there's the even more painful fact that if a Democrat does NOT stay on the floor, any quorum can not only call for a vote... they can call for unanimous consent on a PILE of things that we've been slowing down by failing to grant it.

It's much harder in the US Senate and couldn't work over four months (and would very likely make things worse).

First, I'm not sure if this is true. Even if so, Dems would have to stay off the floor for everything.

I do not expect this to be tried.

There is no bill from the GOP that should EVER get a vote; every bill from those monsters is EVIL.

They would need to stay in hiding... all 49 of them... for months.

And each time, there would be the spectacle of the GOP desperately pulling thug tactics and looking terrible.

It would be one of several strategies, each randomly deployed.

Not to their followers.

I hear Guantanamo Bay is lovely this time of year. And I know it's hard to get people out of GB and into the lower 48.

There will always be a few people on the fence. Maybe they would never vote for decency or for their own families and security. But some of them can be disgusted by some of the same things that disgust us, and just decide it's easier to stay home on Election Day.

I believe there are people who just aren't paying attention and need to be informed and convinced, but I think most of those people if informed would vote for Democrats.

Every "independent" I know, and the ones that the media and Democrats seem obsessed with reaching is nothing more than a Republican who just doesn't want to admit it or who wants to think they are somehow above it all. They may not like everything that the Republican party does and they occasionally won't vote for a Republican, but nothing anyone does could convince those folks to vote for a Democrat. I can just in my immediate family think of 3 or 4 people like that and more if I start going outward from my immediate circle of contact and familiarity.

I think there are way more non-voters and independents on the left of center spectrum that can be reached than there are non-voters in and independents in the middle. Just my anecdotal impression but the few studies I've seen on the subject indicate that I may be more right than wrong about that.

My take from what you say, is that there is a reason to show evil as evil. Those in the "uninformed/lazy Democrats" camp, and those in the "ashamed to admit being a Rethug" camp could both be persuadable in some sense. The latter might be influenced to just stay home, the former might be influenced to not just stay home.

...has for the 22 years I've known him prided himself on being an "independent" and the type of guy that the media loves to fawn over in diners and that Democrats are convinced they can reach if they just compromise enough. He has never, ever voted for a Democrat. He loathes Trump. Despises him. Yet he's still convinced that Trumpism is not representative of the whole party. Nothing anyone could ever in a million years do would get him to vote for a Democrat because he thinks they are weak and feckless and would raise his taxes, and whatever other talking point is out there. He stayed home in 2016. Trump has already driven away those folks, but they are still not ripe for the Democratic picking.

My cousin is a low information type who doesn't really follow politics. He's a union guy who believes in a lot of progressive and liberal policies but is not obsessed with any of them. He stays home because he doesn't think the Democratic party is truly fighting for him. He thinks they cave at the first sign of trouble. He thinks that the best that voting for a Democrat gets him is "things don't get worse" which to someone like you or I is enough. We are informed, we know what is at stake. He could be convinced to get out and vote and has for candidates that actually inspire him (like Obama did in '08). But he just doesn't think that they are going to fight for him and he definitely does not think that they are going to fight to win.

Yes, again these are both just personal anecdotes but I also know a lot of other people who fit 1 of these 2 archetypes. I just hate to see us wasting our time on my father-in-law and not doing enough to convince my cousin.

McCain isn't on the judiciary committee. They can hold their hearings without a single Democrat (and without a Democrat... who will ask the nominee any tough questions that might incite public ire?). Whether that takes them two weeks or two months... how does an "intermittent" quorum-busting strategy keep a vote from occurring?

But stalling for Mueller Time, and dragging it closer to November, can potentially be useful.

The Constitution requires a majority for quorum.

Like the GOP, we have to keep bouncing around, different game every day, keep them confused and one step behind.

And play dirty. The dirtier the better. Start oppo research in earnest and put out damaging sex scandal stories on McTurtle and all the thugs. Trust me, they all have skeletons - they are criminals. Keep them too busy defending themselves to get anything done. We could help by recruiting/funding Avenatti and like-minded people.

Then you are expected to resign in shame, amidst a fusillade of finger-wagging from your own party.

If you are a republican, they will dismiss or ignore the allegations (in the face of video evidence), smear the other party/victim, re-elect you, cheer you on, and give you a cabinet post.

It's how things work.

And if we do some analysis, we could probably find some things that would annoy even RePutin voters. Maybe things that we would consider virtues, given that RePutins seem to live in a universe of total morality inversion and perversion.

That's a smart procedural tactic. McConnell's Merritt Garland rule is being applied here.

That's what's needed to do anything, remember? Right? That's what we were told time and time again.

And they can't dare use the nuclear option because that will come back and bit them in the ass when they lose control. Right? That's what we were told time and time again.

That's why we couldn't do anything when we had the majority so now that they are in the same position they HAVE to play by the rules, right? And if they don't, surely the media will call them out on this. Surely if we just shame them with mildly stern (but polite!) tweets pointing out their hypocrisy they will be completely embarrassed and HAVE to do the right thing. Right?

Guys? Right?

I shouldn't even need this, but just in case:

for SC nominees is gone, which is how we ended up with Gorsuch. I foresaw this when everyone was cheering on Harry Reid for going nuclear on nominations. Knew that we wouldn't always have the majority, and that it would come back to bite us in the ass big time.

...They didn't do what they did with Gorsuch because Harry Reid did anything. They did it because they are evil, treasonous assholes.

but the Senate is big on "tradition" and "precedent." McConnell was able to justify it on the grounds that Reid broke tradition and set a precedent.

The Democrats in the Senate are big on "tradition" and "precedent". The Republicans absolutely do not give a flying fuck about anything but themselves and their constituents. They showed that loud and clear when they used those very same "traditions" to block the will of the people who gave Democrats the White House and a majority in the Senate and House.

for non-SCOTUS judges and other presidential appointees. Would McConnell have done it even if Reid hadn't? Probably. But the public probably doesn't draw the distinction.

...is completely delusional. And the public has no idea that Reid did that since most don't even know anything about the Supreme Court let alone the appointments of appeals court judges and ambassadors and whatever else.

And if we're being entirely accurate the completely unprecedented obstruction of any and all Senate business without 60 votes was the first shot in the battle of breaking traditions.

It's not as simple as that unfortunately.

If there isn't a single Democrat on the floor... who objects to OTHER requests for unanimous consent?

You know... the one thing that has been slowing down the rest of Trump's nominees?

Someone has to be there to do this...

However I remember watching GOP Senators - notably former GOP Senator Tom Coburn, who was the "king" of the "holds". The Senate, under both parties, had difficulty getting around him and I would watch as he pounced when a motion for bill passage or nominations, by unanimous consent, for seemingly innocuous things or very critical things, or for minor nominations, were torpedoed by his "holds" until a compromise addressing his concerns were included (there are many examples).

I personally watched his antics when the Senate was finalizing payments for Pigford II (Black Farmers compensation due to discrimination by USDA for loans) after the courts demanded the payments, the USDA approved them, and the appropriations legislation had been drafted... and he kept it from being passed by unanimous consent by demanding they tack on a Native American issue (he was Senator from Oklahoma) and make some other adjustments.

Among many others.

Even getting him to vote against confirming the next right-wing nominee will be a heavy lift. Getting him to go along with this plan to thwart a vote entirely would be impossible. And if he went along with it, the Senate has some other Democrats who wouldn't.

Having Manchin and other red state Democrat senators run away would give their election opponents a huge advantage and talking point. Would cost us any chance of taking the senate this fall

Legislators were hiding out in NM, OK, wherever they coulf flee to stop a quorum. They were threatened with arrest. They were trying to prevent a vote on redistricting which favored Rs.

Not.

Time to get low down and dirty. Stop taking the high road when it obviously doesn't work, and there's too much at stake.

Let's form a strategic plan and go to war.

First, under the Senate rules, a quorum is presumed to present at all times. To challenge that presumption, someone has to ask the Presiding Officer for a "quorum call." If every Democrat is absent from the chamber, there is no one to demand a quorum call and business proceeds as is a quorum exists. If a Democrat shows up to demand a quorum call, that Democrat's presence means there is a quorum.

Second, while one could argue that if a vote is taken and only 50 votes are cast that it is evidence that a quorum wasn't present. But without a Democrat present, who is going to raise that objection? Could an action taken by 50 members of the Senate later be challenged in court? Possibly, but the outcome would be uncertain (and there would be a threshold issue of who has standing). In any event, there would be no need to get to this point because the Republicans would call for a voice vote and would announce that the nomination had been approved by acclamation; the presumption that there was a quorum, having gone unchallenged and not demonstrably untrue based on a roll call, would govern. (FYI, in the past it was not uncommon for a SCOTUS nominee to be approved "by acclamation."

Finally, in the alternative, if there was concern about the absence of a quorum, the Presiding Officer could direct the Senate Sgt at Arms to round up one or more missing Senators. There is precedence for this: Robert Byrd had the Capitol Hill police compel attendance by Sen. Bob Packwood -- for show, Packwood made the Capitol Police literally carry him into the Senate chamber. It's ugly and stupid and no one looks good, but the fact that the Democrats did it in the not so distant past means that the repubs would feel (and probably be) safe in doing it. And a Joe Manchin or Heidi Heitkamp would probably solve the problem by just showing up -- failure to do so would almost certainly spell their defeat in November and their defeat in November might end up being disastrous if it turns out to be the difference between the Democrats retaking control of the Senate or leaving it in repub (and McConnell's hands).