Revealed: the little-known device used to block Democrats in the House

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2198227,00.html

Republicans use obscure motion 16 times in a year, compared to just 14 for the Democrats in more than a decade of opposition

Elana Schor in Washington
Wednesday October 24, 2007
Guardian Unlimited

All year long, Democrats in the House of Representatives have watched with increasing impatience as their Senate counterparts find themselves bedevilled by a filibuster-wielding Republican minority. On measures criticising the war in Iraq, the House has passed four since May to the Senate's zero; on annual spending bills, the House has cleared all 12 to the Senate's six.

That Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and his Senate Republican colleagues routinely have blocked the Democrats from getting the needed 60 votes on many measures has received considerable press attention, even inspiring a splashy "anti-obstruction" media campaign. snip

But the biggest MTR intrusion of the year came last week, when the Republicans stalled a bill to provide greater judicial oversight of secret wiretapping by the Bush administration with a proposed MTR that even critics begrudgingly called clever. The motion provided that no court order would be needed to tap the phones of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida members - a caveat that frustrated Democrats noted was already in their measure. snip

Faced with the choice between limiting Republican attempts to split their caucus and prodding those members to resist the MTRs, Democrats are likely to choose the latter, at least for the time being. The Republicans' 30-second campaign ad on the wiretapping motion may write itself - featuring ominous Bin Laden visuals and a voiceover murmuring, "Democratic congressman X voted to stop the government from listening to terrorists' phone calls" - but the party's nearly 10-to-1 fundraising advantage over Republicans helps take the sting out of that threat.

If I was a Congressman, there would be an impeachment hearing once per week, and I'd filibuster EVERYTHING the refucklicans try to do.

But we don't. Our media will portray the sick bastard as some kind of martyr that them mean old Dems keep picking on. The thugs will have Chimpy (and his daddy) out crying like a baby at news conferences over it. And it would work for the Rethugs with their complicit media too.

Don

it may strike you as strange but the meme that the dems have no backbone is now confirmed.. due to the actions of live and let live

who refuse to fight for traditional Democratic vales, choosing instead to enable and legitimize the far right- and enrich their coffers in the process.

visible

quit F'n wimp'n out..!!!!!!!!