Rand Paul filibustering Patriot Act extension

He's about 9 hours in at this point. I love it.

For the majority not in the US, the Senate business can be held up if a senator holds the floor and keeps talking for an extended period of time, unless overruled by 3/5ths of the Senate. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Unfortunately, senate rules have become lax, so someone can just say "filibuster" and it shuts down business like an actual filibuster. Unless 3/5ths vote against it, the dude who said it doesn't even have to work for it.

Rand Paul brought back the old school filibuster, standing and talking for 13 hours about drone strikes on US citizens, to hold up confirmation of a new CIA head a couple years ago. He's back at it over the Patriot Act:

http://www.c-span.org/video/?326084-1/senator-rand-paul-rky-nsa-surveillance&live

Finally, some real passion in US politics.

Krcwell said:

Finally, some real passion in US politics.

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Finally?

Regardless of political viewpoints, I would say US politicians come across as pretty passionate in general...

Gustav

With so many republicans running for president in 2016 it is hard to stand out and gain name recognition. A 10 hour filibuster may be more significant as a campaign strategy than hold any legislative importance.  Unfortunately for him the current news cycle is more interested in Ramadi than the senate floor.

I appreciate his libertarian roots and he seems more electable than his dad ever was. I still don't think this is his election to win. We could do a lot worse and probably will. There are several Governors in the running with actual executive experience that seems to be lacking in recent years.

It would be nice to figure out a way to reduce all the time and money spent campaigning for President. We could do much better things with those several $B.

JR

Gustav said:

Krcwell said:

Finally, some real passion in US politics.

Click to expand...

Finally?

Regardless of political viewpoints, I would say US politicians come across as pretty passionate in general...

Gustav

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I think there's a difference between real passion and "political" passion.  Real passion is actually putting your money where your mouth is and sacrificing something for what you believe in. 

Most of the passion I see in US politics I would characterize as "political" passion - just words, some grandstanding, but the politician doesn't actually take any burden upon themselves to back it up and really show that they are passionate about something.  Actions speak louder than words.

Gustav said:

Krcwell said:

Finally, some real passion in US politics.

Click to expand...

Finally?

Regardless of political viewpoints, I would say US politicians come across as pretty passionate in general...

Gustav

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I think the only thing they're passionate about is lining their pockets at the expense of the citizens.

It is a sad fact that almost all US politicians are exorbitantly rich. It is the nature of the game today.
Of course, an individual's personal circumstances impact their "passion".

Bernie isn't rich.  He makes me miss Vermont and its people.

Rocinante said:

Bernie isn't rich.  He makes me miss Vermont and its people.

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Bernie v. Rand would be a really intersting election.

My sincerest hope is neither a Clinton or a Bush gets a nomination.

Krcwell said:

Real passion is actually putting your money where your mouth is and sacrificing something for what you believe in. 

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It is not clear to me how the action you described in your first post qualifies as being more passionate than the general displays of passion I see in american politics under that definition!?

Getting into a discussion about the definition of the phrase passion seems pretty fruitless, though. I think my point was simply, that US politicians generally seem "Media-friendly" (does that make even less sense?), regardless of their personal motives for that type of behaviour.

It sure will be interesting to see what happens

Gustav

The Cult Of Personality

Gustav said:

Krcwell said:

Real passion is actually putting your money where your mouth is and sacrificing something for what you believe in. 

Click to expand...

It is not clear to me how the action you described in your first post qualifies as being more passionate than the general displays of passion I see in american politics under that definition!?

Gustav

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The man stood on his feet speaking for over 10 straight hours to hold up a vote on cloture, which ends debate on a bill and preps it for a vote. The Senate leadership was trying to fast track that vote so that they could all catch their flights on Friday as the Senate has a break for the memorial day holiday this weekend. His colleagues were choosing their own vacation over debating a very serious law, so I'm sure a few of them were pretty mad that he was making that more difficult.

The filibuster in the Senate used to require that the senator actually remain on his feet speaking to control the floor. Nowadays they've done away with that, and senators can just anonymously claim they are filibustering, in effect doing the same thing, without them actually having to work (i.e. the endurance test of standing and talking for hours, possibly days) for it.

Hope that provides some better context.

I like Rand Paul although I wouldn't vote for him. I thought he would be an obstructionist like Ted Cruz but he has turned into an interesting legislator. I was very impressed with his work with Corey Booker to reduce the prison population. He called our sentencing  policies racist which is unusual for a Republican. He has other positions I agree with but lots I don't.

You guys are doing pretty good without me, and I like the tone of the discussion. With only a few exceptions  we are mostly talking about facts, not unknowable motives (while even I am guilty of that).

Addressing last comment first, Yes Rand is far more moderate (electable?) than his father, but still not in tune with most voters. I like that he shines a light on important issues, and brings new young people with their energy into the political process. 
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The filibuster was never seriously expected to change the vote on the patriot act, and IMO trying to tap into a segment of the voting population more concerned about privacy than security. Sunlight and regular reviews of these laws are important for just that reason.
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Personality? Politics is all about the art of the photo-op and sound bite... Rand Paul just checked the box for his privacy cred.
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Passion.... I forget who originally made this joke (I think maybe Groucho Marx or Samuel Clemmons), "Sincerity is most important in politics, and once you can fake that you have it made."  ;D ;D
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Bernie v. Rand...  Actually I see Bernie Sanders and poppa Ron Paul as similar comic relief bookends from opposite ends of the spectrum. Both are court jesters making their extreme policy points with no chance of general election success. I see Rand differentiating himself from his father in pivoting toward the center recently in an attempt to mount a broader appeal.
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Clinton v. Bush...  Yes this triggers lots of unfortunate deja vu. The reality is they are the two with strongest fund raising and political machines. With a left leaning media I fear Bush will be unable to distance himself from his family name. It is remarkable how willing the media is to ignore a long list of Hillary's actual recent bad behavior.
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Bernie and Vermont.    Vermont has the distinction of being so in love with single payer healthcare that they tried to pass a law, but when they scored the cost of it they had to admit it was unsupportable economically  (states have to actually pay for their largess). Another data point ignored by mainstream media in the healthcare discussion.

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Politicians and wealth...  There is a fine line between power and wealth. Enough of one generally brings the other along for the ride. Politicians already get paid several times the median wage of their constituents, but IMO they could be paid even more (to reduce temptation). The elephant in the room is how much money they must raise to pay for re-election campaigns. It's almost like their full time job is raising campaign funds, and governing is their secondary part time job. Term limits that broke the permanent campaigning cycle might help, but would shift power to unelected adminstrata. Reform is never simple, nor without unintended consequences.
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Politicians lining their pockets- One of the more amusing stories (IMO) to come out of this election cycle is watching aHillary try to walk back her claims about being broke when she and Bill left the white house.  Crying poor, when you clearly are the 1% or higher, is not the most effective way to push a populist class warfare message. Remarkably she is still polling well with low information (don't care) voters. Bill's charity may be the big loser from extra scrutiny. Already downrated by charity montiors for low payout ratios. What will follow next is  a closer look at what are probably less than arms length transactions between business and his charity while she was Secretary of state. This may explain why she is so secretive about destroying her old emails, and why their lead defense is you have "no evidence".  This is an interesting story that probably won't go away... somebody has the evidence. Every email has a sender and recipient unless you practice super stealthy email practices, that few in business do.  Of course I am looking at this through my right of center POV. They just released the scrubbed version of her Benghazi emails but I don't expect any news to come from them.
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Enough for now... back down off my soap box.

JR

Excellent monologue, John.

At this point, I'm looking for someone, anyone, who might have a chance at lessening the intense rift between left and right that has spun out of control. Demonizing politics has won more often than not, which is a disgrace. Rand thus far has seemed to have a decent factual backup of any demonizing he has done, and with most of it geared towards Hillary,  he's on pretty solid ground. He also has a lot of outreach across the aisle, be it the Cory Booker partnered work mentioned above, or that his primary supporter throughout the filibuster was democratic senator Wyden.

Hillary can only win in a lesser-of-two evils matchup, which would be a Clinton Bush election in the eyes of a majority of the US.  The Clinton smear machine is powerful, and the Bush name carries as much baggage (rightly or, in my opinion, wrongly) as the Clinton name.

Scott Walker is another good possibility, he has weathered and overcome the most vile of persistent attack from the Left imaginable since taking the governorship  of  Wisconsin.

I still hold out some small hope that Trey Gowdy's thorough and exemplary work will invalidate the possibility of a Hillary commander in chief. Despite my overwhelming cynicism towards any politician being honest, I think Mr. gowdy is a straight shooter.

Hilary will be pushed way more for gender vs her record.  FWIW I don't want to see another bush V clinton thing...

pucho812 said:

Hilary will be pushed way more for gender vs her record.  FWIW I don't want to see another bush V clinton thing...

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If it does come down Bush vs. Clinton, assuming one of them serves two terms, that would make only 4 out of 44 years (1980-2024) that a Bush or Clinton was NOT in some way in the White House.

1980-1988 George HW Bush Vice President
1988-1992 George HW Bush President
1992-2000 Bill Clinton President
2000-2008 George W Bush President
2009-2013 Hillary Clinton Secretary of State
2016-2024 God help us

Krcwell said:

Excellent monologue, John.

At this point, I'm looking for someone, anyone, who might have a chance at lessening the intense rift between left and right that has spun out of control.

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Be careful what you wish for... Our government by design is contentious and inefficient. It should be hard to pass any legislation, so only important stuff gets passed, and then only after much deliberation.

A recent perversion of the process is them passing sweeping legislation in skeletal form, leaving it up to (unelected)  regulators to flesh out the letter of the law. So now not only do you have to wait till they pass it to read it, you still can't read it then. you have to wait until the regulators finish writing it, and they are still grinding away on Dodd-Frank these years later. So  No I don't want them holding hands and working together more.

Demonizing politics has won more often than not, which is a disgrace. Rand thus far has seemed to have a decent factual backup of any demonizing he has done, and with most of it geared towards Hillary,  he's on pretty solid ground. He also has a lot of outreach across the aisle, be it the Cory Booker partnered work mentioned above, or that his primary supporter throughout the filibuster was democratic senator Wyden.

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Mud slinging will always be with us because it works. People more often vote against somebody for a single issue reason than vote for somebody.

Hillary can only win in a lesser-of-two evils matchup, which would be a Clinton Bush election in the eyes of a majority of the US.  The Clinton smear machine is powerful, and the Bush name carries as much baggage (rightly or, in my opinion, wrongly) as the Clinton name.

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Pretty much...  Hillary would also allow the PC motivated to check off the female president box, just like so many were ecstatic about checking off the black president box.

I wouldn't mind a female leader with real gravitas (like  Condoleeza Rice) but she seems too smart to slum around in politics any more.

Scott Walker is another good possibility, he has weathered and overcome the most vile of persistent attack from the Left imaginable since taking the governorship  of  Wisconsin.

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They are just getting warmed up...The better he does in the running, the more focus he will get. A new recent attack is his lack of a college degree... Since i dropped out too I don't hold that against him, but the left has already thrown that against the wall to see if it will stick.

I still hold out some small hope that Trey Gowdy's thorough and exemplary work will invalidate the possibility of a Hillary commander in chief. Despite my overwhelming cynicism towards any politician being honest, I think Mr. gowdy is a straight shooter.

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There is a natural ebb and flow as the parties in charge of congressional investigations shift their focus back and forth as parties change places. Gowdy is a former prosecutor so will do an OK job, but congress in general has allowed people under investigation to get away with way too much, IMO. .  Eric Holder was the only attorney general to be held in contempt of congress for refusing to cooperate with investigations (Lois Lerner of the IRS too).

Us mere citizens would go to jail for not bending to the congresses will.

JR

JohnRoberts said:

Be careful what you wish for... Our government by design is contentious and inefficient. It should be hard to pass any legislation, so only important stuff gets passed, and then only after much deliberation.

A recent perversion of the process is them passing sweeping legislation in skeletal form, leaving it up to (unelected)  regulators to flesh out the letter of the law. So now not only do you have to wait till they pass it to read it, you still can't read it then. you have to wait until the regulators finish writing it, and they are still grinding away on Dodd-Frank these years later. So  No I don't want them holding hands and working together more

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I love the fact that congress has been in gridlock. The press tried to use it as a criticism , something like 3 bills passed in a year. Good. I'd love to see a congressional year with a healthy negative output: repeal more than you pass.

As far as the "let regulators figure it out" legislation, that's why I've been a big fan of Lee, Cruz and Paul's work to highlight this obscenity. All 3 have remained consistent on their core principles, doing what the voters put them there to do. I hate that usual main stream media "obstructionist" garbage... Being an obstructionist is what the people who voted for them sent them to do. So, basically, the media doesn't like politicians actually representing the will of their constituency?

They are just getting warmed up...The better he does in the running, the more focus he will get. A new recent attack is his lack of a college degree... Since i dropped out too I don't hold that against him, but the left has already thrown that against the wall to see if it will stick.

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I don't know... The John Doe investigations, the union mob tactics... Those can slip under the radar on a state level, but won't be nearly as effective on a national campaign. He was such a target that I doubt there's any dirt left to dig up on him. The Wisconsin recall election was a huge national union proxy war, they went all out. He survived and thrived.

as it currently stands congress only works two days out of the week. Imagine the damage they could really do if they worked all 5...