Reid Admits It: 'I Don't Have Votes For Johnsen...Yet'
It's been clear for weeks now that Senate leadership hadn't brought the question of confirming Dawn Johnsen--the President's nominee to head the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel--to a vote on the floor because he hasn't had the votes. Sen. Harry Reid's office never said as much, but how else to explain that other, less critical nominations were moving and not hers?
Last night Reid made it explicit. "Right now we're finding out when to do that," Reid said, according to Roll Call. "We need a couple Republican votes until we can get to 60."
Right now there are 59 Democrats in the caucus. Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) has said he's "concerned" about her nomination, but his office strongly suggested to me that he'd vote for cloture on her confirmation. Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) has said he "opposes" Johnsen, but hasn't answered the cloture question thusfar. Republican Sen. Dick Lugar (R-IN), though, says he supports her. Assuming Nelson's cloture vote really will be there, but that Specter will continue his...unpredictable streak, that means Democrats need one more Republican to get behind her.
For what it's worth, the Senators from Maine haven't responded to my repeated requests for comment on this question.
Josh
Matt
Eric
Yet another reason why we need Senator Al Franken. And why the Maine senators are invertebrates.
May 13, 2009 9:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yet another reason we need Kennedy to come back to the Senate or let someone else take his seat...
May 13, 2009 1:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, please. He's more than earned the right to stay in office if he wants -- especially with health care reform about to start.
May 13, 2009 2:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, fuck you! Ted Kennedy has gotten off his near-death bed to take votes this term. We wouldn't be even in the health care reform ball park if it weren't for him. He's spent the last 35 years of his life fighting for this. He's not dying or retiring until we get it. Besides, he'll be there when we need him.
Harry Reid called that vote today knowing there weren't enough votes just to highlight how ridiculous the republicans are.
May 13, 2009 4:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Back during FDR's administration, the public got so fed up with the repuglicans they reduced their numbers to a grand total of 16 in the Senate. I think it's time we show the repuglican just how much political clout we really have with the public.
May 13, 2009 9:11 AM | Reply | Permalink
Forget that--call Harry Reid's office like I just did and whale on them! Bring it out of committee and vote her up or down just like the Repugs insisted was the right thing to do all those years they complained about the Dems. I'm sick and tired of the spineless Senator from NV holding things up!
May 13, 2009 10:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
Okay, did you miss this part:
That's the next two years in a nutshell, even after we get Franken in and we need to get used to it. Forcing a vote now = "we lose." Reid is trying to win the fight which means delaying until he's sure he's got 60 in the bag. If Reid was LBJ, J. Edgar Hoover, Boss Tweed, Uncle Joe Cannon and George S. Patton all rolled into one overwhelming superpowered force of nature, he'd still be facing the fact that he's only got as much power as the people who elect him--i.e. the Senate Democratic Caucus--will let him have.
Maybe you think it would be better for us to accept defeat than to continue to delay these votes. Fine. Perfectly reasonable, if debatable, POV. But wrapping it up in an attack on Reid implies that its the only possible point of view and it just ain't so.
May 13, 2009 12:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
NC, your argument as I understand it is that we should stop attacking Reid, and give him a chance to give President Obama his nominees, slowly and methodically, as he craftily works Procedure to his advantage.
This brings up a whole slew of questions. First off, did George W. Bush have to wait patiently while the minority Dems obstructed his heinous picks for his heinous administration? No.
Second, those few times that Bush had a problem, did he not simply say "fuck you", and misuse the recess appointment? Yes, he did.
Third, did he pay in any way politically, by riding roughshod over the minority like that? No, he did not.
Fourth, do you really think that Obama has the political will to do what Dubya did (successfully)?
And finally:
Do you honestly think that by Reid's not showing a good, aggressive offense now, this is somehow going to make it any easier, when Obama attempts the deadly serious business of nominating a Sipreme Court Justice? Hell, they're already pissing in his face, by overtly raising money to oppose... "Your Candidate Here"?
Is it me, or is that world-class chutzpah?
I hate to say this, but Grover Norquist had it right, when he suggested that one's political opposition must be housebroken, like errant pets. I just wish we had a few hardball players like that, on the side of the angels. It's not like it wouldn't work. Q.E.D.
May 13, 2009 1:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why didn't Bush have these problems with the 107th Congress when there was a 50/50 split in the Senate. Am I just not remembering? It seems to me that Reid is letting the Republicans automatically filibuster on every issue.
May 13, 2009 1:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
This crap just galls me to no end. Democracy isn't supposed to be the rule by the minority! Ried needs to be gunning to expose the GOP in the Senate for what they are...bigots and morally corrupt assholes who stand for stopping Obama and the progressives at all costs. The question is what is Reid doing to stop this maddness and can the democatrs deliver the change we voted for! Hell, Reid can't even carry his own caucus. It's time for a change and let Harry be a Senator and find a effective leader for the majority leader position.
May 13, 2009 9:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
As soon as Senate Majority Leader is on my ballot, I'll totally vote for someone else.
However, as long as its an office filled by a vote of the senators in the majority caucus, he'll never have more power than they give him and Reid has exactly as much power over them as a majority of them want him to have. The day he starts stepping over the line they draw for him is the day someone one else unseats him on a platform of "I'll be weaker."
May 13, 2009 12:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm so tired of reading Ben Nelsons name. The guy is a dip shit or something.
May 13, 2009 9:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
So what you are basically saying is that Arlen Specter still opposes cloture on Dawn Johnsen. That poses an obvious question: Does anyone have a link for making donations to Joe Sestak?
May 13, 2009 9:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
See ActBlue. Sestak funding is set up there for now.
May 13, 2009 10:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'll check it out. Thanks!
May 13, 2009 10:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, if Specter is holding up the nominee by refusing to vote for cloture, that is completely unacceptable. Voting for cloture for the President's nominees is a bare minimum requirement for members of the President's party. If Specter needs to preserve the illusion that he has core principles and hasn't just flipped all his opinions from last month, he can justify cloture as allowing an up or down vote on the nominee before he votes against her. No problem. But there is absolutely no reason we should need two Republicans for cloture.
This is not good precedent for the upcoming Supreme Court nomination. Ugh.
May 13, 2009 12:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wow, I'm SO glad that the Republicans are holding Franken's seat hostage...this is just great news for democracy...
meh.
May 13, 2009 10:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
Is Johnsen's problem that "she's fiecre, she's feminist, and she's in your face?"
May 13, 2009 10:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
No, it's that she's been outspoken in criticizing the politicization (pdf) of the Office of Legal Counsel by the Bush Administration and smacking down the justification for torture and unconstrained executive power. A sample:
Her work for NARAL is red meat for the base, but this is what they're really afraid of.
May 13, 2009 12:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Dawn Johnsen's problem is that she supports the rule of law. Apparently, to Republicans, that is an unacceptable trait in someone nominated to the office charged with advising the Administration on the requirements of the law.
I'm not just being snarky here. When you strip away the spin, that's really what the Republicans are saying. It's an atrociously ridiculous position for any major party to take in a nation that believes itself free.
May 13, 2009 2:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ted Olson, who I think we can all agree was a very partisan pick for solicitor general, was confirmed in the Senate by a vote of 51-47. The Dems were almost all opposed but they didn't filibuster and let his confirmation come to a floor vote. If the Johnsen confirmation were allowed to hit the floor for a vote, she'd like be confirmed by more than 51 votes, probably several more.
The GOPers (and whiny Blue Dogs/Specter) look petty in their attempts to prevent a floor vote on Johnsen. Could you imagine the whining and screaming we would have heard if the Dems had threatened or actually filibustered the Olson nomination.
(Olson, perhaps remembering his own experience, has noted that the GOP should allow Harold Koh to come to a floor vote. Not sure what his thoughts are on Johnsen. It's not that he supports or agrees with Koh but he doesn't think filibustering a qualified presidential nominee - remember this is a temporary position, it's not like a SCOTUS seat or Fed judgeship - simply because of political differences is appropriate or worthwhile.)
May 13, 2009 10:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
If Reid, Obama and the rest of the Democrats just cave to a novel extra-Constitutional arrangement whereby nothing at all can happen in the Senate without a 60-vote supermajority, they will be abject failures and out of power sooner than we like to think. Do they really not understand the stakes here?
May 13, 2009 10:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
Here is why I don't think the GOP will be punished at the ballot box if they keep this up:
Most voters (I think... I hope!) understand the basic concept that the number of Republicans needs to be pared-down, in order for the Obama Administration to accomplish anything.
But at election time, all politics, as the saying goes, becomes local. No one will take pulling the lever for Senator Claghorn, R-Dumbfuckistan, in a larger context of "majority vs. minority". They will simply give Claghorn all the support they've ever given him in the past, and will measure his opponent in terms of whether he has more gravitas than the incumbent Claghorn... not whether a new Dem will change the complexion of the Supermajority Senate.
This effect also comes into play... perhaps more critically... during Democratic primaries in states represented by Blue Dog Democrats. In fact, many Democratic voters pride themselves a little, not just in supporting their buddy the incumbent, but in always voting for "the Democrat".
If there even actually is a primary for an Evan Bayh or a Ben Nelson, it all comes down to name recognition and money, and right there is where the incumbent wins the entire race.
Joe the Average Voter will not stop to consider that he has just supported maybe 100 more votes against cloture, in the real world (or in Washington, which substitutes for it).
May 13, 2009 12:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Harry Reid is a weak leader.
Republicans pushed through absolutely anything they wanted with less than 60 votes.
It's called politics Reid. Get off your ass and get in the game.
May 13, 2009 10:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
BBQ,
I agree, Reid is a eunich. We need more aggressive leaders.
Let "The Party Of No" filibuster, it will play good on the nightly news and cable shows.
May 13, 2009 12:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
You have the votes, MORmON, you just don't have the balls to press the Pubelickens.
May 13, 2009 11:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
It's his own caucus that's the real problem. He's playing kissy-face with Specter, for example, when Specter won't even vote for cloture- not even confirmation- on a Presidential non-cabinet nominee? That's complete bullshit. Reid is fucking useless.
May 13, 2009 11:11 AM | Reply | Permalink
Two words. RECESS APPOINTMENT. At some point, you would think the President would just do it. Recess appoint the whole entire slate of people the Republicans are holding up for no good reason. Do it in public, so as to rub their noses in it. Screw this 60 votes nonsense.
May 13, 2009 11:09 AM | Reply | Permalink
Absolutely right. Obama should just say "Frack You - I need my team in place" and recess appoint anyone being held up.
He can get them all confirmed in 2011 when we have 66 Democratic Senators.
May 13, 2009 11:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, yes, yes!!! I hope that he calls a special press conference after he makes the appt.
I wish there were a petition to get Reid out of the M.L. spot and give it to a real leader.
May 13, 2009 11:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
People wonder why I'm not always wildly enthusiastic about Obama. THIS is why. This kind of thing is just not his style, and he doesn't seem to understand that it's sometimes really needed. I still hope that at some point he'll have had enough of this crap and will get harder-nosed. We'll see.
May 13, 2009 11:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah but that would make Democrats hypocrites in the process. Remember in the 110th Congress during recesses, Bush tried to appoint his people through that and the Democrats blocked that by having Pro Forma sessions during breaks. Yeah, I really want Johnsen in office where she rightfully belongs to be. But not by that way.
May 13, 2009 4:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good God why does this man keep telling us that it takes 60 votes to pass the USS?
May 13, 2009 11:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
Mukasey was also confirmed with much less than 60 votes. I get the feeling if there was only ONE Republican in the Senate, Reid would still be unable & unwilling to get things done. He should have been fired a long time ago.
May 13, 2009 11:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
The reality is that it wouldn't matter who the nominee is. There is no secret to the fact that the republicans do NOT want 'torture' investigated and have been using holding up confirmation as a form of manipulation and an expression of protest for releasing information on torture to the public.
May 13, 2009 12:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
Is there a difference between Harry Reid and a jellyfish?
May 13, 2009 12:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
a jellyfish can sting.
May 13, 2009 12:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good one.
May 13, 2009 1:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, but if you piss on a jellyfish sting, it stops hurting. If you piss on Harry Reid, he writes a sternly worded letter and keeps on whining.
May 13, 2009 3:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
heh, I hear that meat tenderizing powder can stop the sting too. It would probably just make Reid sneeze though.
May 13, 2009 3:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
How disgraceful that the Republicans have now permanently defined "the majority" to mean "60 votes".
I am trying to imagine how our media brahmins (seen recently groaning at comedians, at the WHCA dinner) would have reacted if the Democratic minority of a few years back had set such an obstructionist course for the Senate.
Methinks the folks dictating the conversation back then would not exactly have embraced the current, blase acceptance of this tactic as Just Another Day In Washington.
I really don't know who would have squealed like a tortured animal louder: the press, or the Republican majority.
May 13, 2009 12:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
THE CORE OF THEIR TORTURE ARGUMENT: That if we perform these acts on our soldiers during training, therefore, these acts are not torture. Is the same as saying that if you perform acts(sexual acts) with your wife, then it is okay if you perform those acts on a 13 year old. Since they are both sexual acts, therefore they are both okay. One is a loving act, the other is sexual molestation. Just because an act is okay under condition A, doesnt mean that same act is okay under condition B. This goes to the SERE vs Torture framing that cheney is using as defense.
So, if it is okay for you to perform an act(a killing act) on enemy soldiers, you cannot claim that this makes it okay for you to do the same to 12 of your neighbours. One is serving your country, the other is murder. You cannot claim that since they are both the same act of killing, therefore killing 12 of your neighbours is somehow justified. The same way these torture apologist are using SERE training to justify torture. Like i said, Just because an act is okay under condition A, doesnt mean that same act is okay under condition B.
If you are to follow the cheney logic of: this is done to our soldiers, therefore it is okay. One can use that strain of reasoning to justify practically anything. Think of it. I can always find a condition where something is bound to be legal or even moral, then turn around and say, since it is moral/legal in this situation( A), therefore it is moral/legal under new situation( B) that suits me. I can use that reasoning to justify anything i want to do. Including cheating, stealing, physical assault, killing, harassment, infanticide, genocide, even holocaust.
It is not a ALL YES or ALL NO situation.
Otherwise, since boxing or martial arts is okay, therefore is it moral/legal for me to start kicking you around?!?! That is the SERE argument that cheney is advancing. It is ridiculous, offensive, dangerous, and even abominable. Since you can use it to justify any acts on this planet.
May 13, 2009 12:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Reid is a freaking wussie.
As Glenzilla points out, "during Reid's tenure as Majority Leader, Michael Mukasey was confirmed as Bush's Attorney General with a grand total of 53 Senate votes."
Reid should man up and get on with getting President Obama's nominees confirmed, or he should step down as Majority Leader.
May 13, 2009 1:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Harry, Harry, Harry. If the situation was reversed the Republicans would FIGHT for their President's nominee. We'd be hearing "up or down vote" all day long.
This guy can't use his bully pulpit. The most important thing to him is Senate collegiality and not being too confrontational with the right wing.
I had so much hope for Harry! The man who took down the mob in Vegas, Mr. Tough Guy!
Not so much.
May 13, 2009 1:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
This I can agree with. I understand why, if the other guy wants it to take 60, it takes 60. Them's the rules. It's just that the ReagaNazis never play by the rules.
And man, can they work the media...
So, hell, yes, Harry should announce every day: " This is Day # of our President's team held hostage by the disloyal opposition."
Then he should start using his backroom powers. Be a shame, for example, if Lindsey Graham suddenly had his office handed over to incoming-Senator Franken, and got moved to a broom closet in the Dome...
May 13, 2009 2:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is A FAILURE OF LEADERSHIP on Reids part. Get his ass outta here. What a joke.
May 13, 2009 4:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
What you all don't understand is that Harry needs Republicans' help in keeping his powder dry. Larry Craig is the only one who will reach up his rectum and pull the tube out.
May 13, 2009 7:03 PM | Reply | Permalink