HuffPo: Lieberman In '94: The Filibuster "Ails Washington" And Should Be Eliminated

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Lieberman In '94: The Filibuster "Ails Washington" And Should Be Eliminated

Senator Joseph Lieberman's (I-Conn) threat to filibuster health care legislation that includes a public option for insurance coverage has sent minor shock-waves throughout Washington.

Among Republicans, the Connecticut Independent inspired a round of cheers for another streak of political independence. Among progressives the question being asked is: How could one senator, through threat of filibuster, hold a historic reform process hostage?

It's a question Lieberman himself once asked. And it's a procedural ploy he once lamented.

Fifteen years ago, as a freshman Democrat, Lieberman actually worked to have the filibuster killed. He deemed the parliamentary maneuver "a dinosaur" that had become "a symbol of a lot that ails Washington today." And, in tandem with Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), he introduced legislation that -- if it had been enacted -- would have made his current opposition to health care absolutely toothless.

After the congressional elections of 1994, in which the power of both chambers switched hands from Democrats to Republicans, Lieberman and Harkin made a rather bold move. Political obstructionism, the two said, had grown out of hand. And even though Democrats were now in the minority, if the Senate ever wanted to make legislative progress the rules needed to be revamped. On November 22, 1994, the senators held a press conference announcing their intention to drastically water down the power of the filibuster. Lieberman offered the following quotes (which, in today's context, seem utterly out of place for the now Connecticut Independent):

"People are fed up -- frustrated and fed up and angry about the way in which our government does not work, about the way in which we come down here and get into a lot of political games and seem to -- partisan tugs of war and forget why we're here, which is to serve the American people. And I think the filibuster has become not only in reality an obstacle to accomplishment here, but it also a symbol of a lot that ails Washington today."

"But I do want to say that the Republicans were not the only perpetrators of filibuster gridlock, there were occasions when Democrats did it as well. And the long and the short of it is that the abuse of the filibuster was bipartisan and so its demise should be bipartisan as well."

"The whole process of individual senators being able to hold up legislation, which in a sense is an extension of the filibuster because the hold has been understood in one way to be a threat to filibuster -- it's just unfair."

"I'm very proud to be standing here with Tom as two Democrats saying that we're going to begin this fight, because we've just been stung by the filibuster for a period of years, and even though the tables have now turned, it doesn't make it right for us to use this instrument that we so vilified."

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/30/lieberman-in-94-the-filib_n_340255.html

[rhett o rick]

1. The Senate Democrats choose Slobberman over LaMont. So they best not complain.

The Senate good ole boys club loves him for some reason.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

2. I don't think Lieberman can be embarrassed

I don't care how much he contradicts himself or is caught doing the very thing he's condemned in the past. I don't know if there's a word for it in the lexicon of psychology but he just can't feel shame.

[rhett o rick]

3. His blatant arrogance is beyond embarrassment. nt

[JerseygirlCT]

4. Lieberman has one interest only: Lieberman

he'll say or do anything that he thinks gets him attention and plays into his martyr complex.