Obama pushes for measures he opposed while in Senate

[reality_hammer]

At this point I don't think anyone is surprised by the continued hypocrisy of the Democrats. When they were in the minority in 2005 they called the "nuclear" option "arrogant" and "not what the Founders intended".
Apparently the nuclear option is now neither arrogant nor against the principles of the Founding Fathers. Gee, I wonder what's changed

Comments

[blueduck37]

This is my favorite meme that has emerged from the right this month... because it is the one in which it is most obvious that everyone saying it knows they are full of shit.

Referring to the process of reconciliation as the 'nuclear option' specifically, knowing that the majority of Americans don't pay enough attention to politics to remember what BS that is.

The "nuclear option", of course, refers to a Republican effort during the Bush administration to outlaw filibusters of judicial nominees. The GOP, in other words, wanted to create a new Senate rule to get Bush's nominees approved. Reconciliation was, and remains, a longstanding rule of the Senate.

The two issues have no connection. But it makes for scarier Fox News/Drudge clips to conflate the two.

[reality_hammer]

I could explain that the term "nuclear option" refers to a process that circumvents filibusters but that would suggest that I don't know you are merely repeating a Democrat meme.

[blueduck37]

Ummm, no.

Again, the term "nuclear option" refers to a Republican effort during the Bush administration to outlaw filibusters of judicial nominees. The GOP, in other words, wanted to create a new Senate rule to get Bush's nominees approved. Reconciliation was, and remains, a longstanding rule of the Senate.

(And Sen. Judd Gregg agrees!)

The two issues have no connection.

You cannot provide me with an example of anyone referring to reconciliation as the "nuclear option" prior to this year.

[reality_hammer]

Um, yes.

"Nuclear" reflects the dramatic escalation of tactics to circumvent the 60 vote threshold.

Don't pretend it's a defined parliamentary procedure.