Fight the Filibusters

Written by: Benjamin Iglar-Mobley on Jul 10, 2008 6:35 PM EDT

Electing Obama may not be enough.

The 110th Congress has set a record of filibusters in the Senate, and that record was set just one year into its two-year term. This Senate has filibustered more legislation in just one year than any previous Congress did in two years. Essentially, Republicans are opposing every piece of legislation the Democrats are trying to put forward, and that with Bush waiting at the other end with his veto pen in hand.

How cooperative will the Republicans be with a President Obama waiting to sign that legislation into law?

We should be working to push for as large a majority in the Senate as we can possibly win, ideally all the way to a 60-vote filibuster-proof supermajority even without Lieberman's unreliable vote.

Obviously, DFA is working hard for Democrats up and down the ballot, but maybe there could more of a concerted effort toward this goal. As an organization we could approach Senator Obama with a proposal that he make it a point to stage, between the convention and November, at least one campaign appearance with every last Democrat running for Senate who has even a ghost of a chance of winning a seat currently held by a Republican.

The blog site MyDD.com is working on exactly such an effort.  See their write-up of what they're trying to do:

http://www.mydd.com/story/2008/6/24/112814/468

See also their fundraising page for the effort:

http://www.actblue.com/page/roadto60

Promoting the candidates is good, raising money for them is good; but having Obama make a campaign appearance with each of them is even better.

This is an opportunity for DFA to leverage the strategy going forward. Winning elections for Democrats is not enough; we want to win passage of progressive legislation. Obviously not every Democrat running is going to be a progressive, but each one will be more likely than the lock-step Republicans to vote to end debate on legislation and move it to floor vote.

Ben Iglar-Mobley

. . .

(As an aside, I've created a flier to answer those car ribbon "support the troops" magnets we see everywhere, showing how Obama and the Democrats are truly the ones supporting the troops with their votes. You can see it here:

http://democracyforamerica.com/uploads/0005/7051/Support_Our_Troops.doc 

Print it out, copy it, and slip it under those magnets. Honestly, I don't know how Republicans can be getting the military vote any more!)

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