Cojones Awards

Senator Tom Udall to Call a Point of Order to Throw Out the Filibuster Rule

  • davidswanson's picture
    davidswanson
    Want to meet our members? Click 'Join' above!

Senator Tom Udall of New Mexico has put an honest description of the antidemocratic filibuster rule on his website.

According to Jon Walker at FireDogLake Udall plans to call a point of order at the start of the next Congress to eliminate the filibuster rule.

This is the real solution that we need (although not all experts agree it has to wait for the start of a session), not asking the Vice President pretty please to declare the rule unconstitutional as Thomas Geoghegan suggests or supporting a filibusterable bill or pushing for a vote of -- even worse -- 67 senators (see the FireDogLake link above).

The filibuster rule just isn't very popular among those who know what it is.  Recently Pew found that 26% of Americans knew how many votes were needed to get around a filibuster. Zogby reports that 32% want to get rid of that anti-democratic blockage.

And these two polls were probably looking at samples of the same population, given Zogby's findings confirming vast ignorance: Only 34% knew Republicans use the filibuster more. Only 28% knew the House represented public opinion better than the Senate.

Two weeks after those polls came out, a CBS/New York Times poll found that 50% want the filibuster rule thrown out.  At that rate of increase, we should be at 100% by April.  But it all depends how the pollster asks the question.  This one asked if people would prefer simple majority rule to minority rule by 41 senators.  The Zogby poll asked people whether the filibuster rule was undemocratic rather than pointing that fact out to them.

Chris Bowers at Open Left has a whip list of Senators willing to throw out the filibuster rule.  Get whipping!

 

Cojones Award #3: Dennis Kucinich

  • Bob Fertik's picture
    Bob Fertik
    Want to meet our members? Click 'Join' above!

It's been a year since we last awarded our highly-coveted Cojones Award. But Rep. Dennis Kucinich has definitely earned one for informing House Democrats that he will soon introduce Articles of Impeachment for Dick Cheney.

Kucinich knows full well that he is defying Speaker Pelosi and the overwhelming majority of House Democrats who are terrified of Cheney, Bush, and especially Karl Rove. But Kucinich is driven by an evenĀ greater fear, that Bush-Cheney-Rove will start yet another disastrous war, this time in Iran.

Cojones Award #2: Rep. Nancy Pelosi

  • Bob Fertik's picture
    Bob Fertik
    Want to meet our members? Click 'Join' above!

Rep. Nancy PelosiĀ unloaded on George W. Bush - and earned a coveted Cojones Award! Here's the video; transcript courtesy of Atrios.

"If you want to reduce our dependence on foreign oil and therefore improve our national security situation, you can't do it if you're a Republican because you are too wedded to the oil companies. We have two oilmen in the white house. The logical follow-up from that is $3 a gallon gasoline. There is no accident. It is a cause and effect. A cause and effect.

Cojones Award #1: Rep. Lacy Clay

  • Bob Fertik's picture
    Bob Fertik
    Want to meet our members? Click 'Join' above!

After 28 years of surrendering to the Republican Right, Democrats.com wants elected Democrats to finally show some cojones. So today we are announcing a new award: the Cojones Award for Democrats who show some.

Our first Cojones Award winner is Rep. Lacy Clay (MO-1).

How did he earn our prestigious award? Simply by telling it like it is.

Rep. Clay calls for pulling U.S. troops from Iraq

Syndicate content