Ezra Klein’s article in Newsweek is pretty amusing. Ezra is another Democrat who has taken to blaming the Filibuster for the Senate not passing the a deeply-unpopular health care bill. His article contains some interesting history of about the filibuster, but it lacks any reason why the Senate should do away with the filibuster. Ezra opines:

This is the consequence of running the Senate by twisting the rules rather than following their spirit. It’s not just that you have the 60-vote filibuster process competing against the 51-vote reconciliation process. It’s that you have the Senate wasting days and weeks in cloture votes for doomed filibusters and rewriting legislation to conform to the odd limits of the reconciliation process. And as the minority becomes less responsible with the filibuster (and hoo boy, have minority Republicans become less responsible with the filibuster), the majority needs to use reconciliation more often.

 

Even a kid in civics class would recognize that this is all nuts. The Senate should eliminate the filibuster and budget reconciliation, and require either a 51- or 60-vote majority. Exploiting loopholes is no way to run a country.

You are right Ezra, exploiting loopholes is no way to run a country. A better way is by being bipartisan. If the Democrats had worked from the beginning to be bipartisan, they could have passed a bill a year ago. If you have minority Republicans being “less responsible with the filibuster”, you might have why. In this case, we have a Democratic majority that wants to ram through a partisan health care bill that the public doesn’t want. I’m not speaking to all cases of the Republicans using the filibuster, but in this case it looks like it is the Republicans who are responsibly using the filibuster to try to defeat a program the American people don’t want. That’s a reason to keep the filibuster, not repeal it. 

Steve Hayward has an interesting piece in the Washington Post about Reagan, Palin, and the tea parties.

Sarah Palin invokes him. Mitt Romney glorifies him. The "tea party" movement hopes to recapture him. And the Republican Party still can’t get over him.

 

Six years after his death, and almost a century since his birth, conservatives are more transfixed than ever by Ronald Reagan, so much so that I fully expect a Gipper anxiety disorder to appear in the next edition of the psychiatrists’ diagnostic manual.

…

You can’t assume the Reagan mantle simply by repeating his name ad nauseum or by bickering with primary opponents over who is more like him. (Romney and Huckabee duked it out in the 2008 campaign, engaging in a Reaganer-than-thou exchange memorable for its inanity — lots of good it did them.) That said, there are two largely unrecognized elements of Reagan’s statecraft that his imitators should recognize and study if they truly want to emulate him.

 

The first is the deliberate but unseen crafting of Reagan’s public profile. As we have come to learn with the opening over the past decade of Reagan’s personal papers, his public style was a product of enormous discipline, hard work and calculation. Long before Palin was ridiculed for writing reminders on her hand, Reagan was derided as the 3-by-5 note card candidate (actually, he used 4-by-6 cards) — but his cards were his means of staying succinctly on point and delivering his message in a compelling way. Reagan’s speeches, including his State of the Union addresses, were typically much shorter than average. He knew from show business the power of leaving your audience wanting more. Is there a politician today who you wish gave longer speeches?

 

The second underappreciated aspect of Reagan’s statecraft is his idiosyncratic ideology — entirely a product of his self-study, much of which he concealed. Some of it was orthodox, small-government conservatism (he once stated that "the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism"), but it was leavened with an older liberalism, part of which he inherited from FDR.

My favorite thing about Sarah Palin is that her mere existence drives many lefties into braindead apoplexy. The latest example is that lefties are losing their minds when they learn that Palin’s grandson has received healthcare through the Indian Health Services and the Alaska Native Medical Center. They believe it is hypocrisy for Palin’s daughter to use government-provided services.  I guess they think that Tripp Palin shouldn’t go to public school, or ever set foot on public lands, or use public roads…

Kim Strassel has another good article in today’s WSJ:

The sight of ObamaCare on life support has many Democrats disappointed. It could be worse. They could be Pfizer CEO Jeffrey Kindler.

 

The twin events of an Obama presidency and a financial crisis rattled corporate America. Public anger put companies on the defensive. A liberal president vowing to punish firms that didn’t aid his agenda got companies scared.

 

Fortune 500 execs could stand up for a free market that benefits consumers and shareholders, or hitch their cart to the new Democratic majority. Pfizer’s Mr. Kindler is a case study in the hitch-and-hope mentality—a CEO who became the motivating force behind Big Pharma’s $80 billion "deal" on reform, and industry support of ObamaCare. With that health agenda burning, the choice isn’t looking so grand.

…

Mr. Kindler surely believed Democrats would treat his industry gently. The strategy: The industry would pledge $80 billion to reform. In return it would get greater volume and a requirement that people buy brand-name drugs. Democrats would also fight against drug reimportation and forgo price controls.

 

No one pushed harder than Mr. Kindler. The CEO made no fewer than five trips to the White House last year. He was the man prodding Pharmaceutical Researchers and Manufacturers of America head Billy Tauzin every step. He wrote an op-ed with the SEIU’s Mr. Stern demanding reform. He pressed the industry’s $150 million ad campaign promoting ObamaCare, rolled out with liberal activist groups.

 

Critics warned the legislation would lead to a government takeover and price controls. They warned Democrats would take the money and double-cross them. None of it fazed the industry, right up until ObamaCare imploded.

 

Mr. Kindler and Co. are left with the ashes. Having got this far (with Big Pharma’s help), Democrats are more desperate than ever to pass "something." It won’t include any upside for drug companies. There is talk instead of "popular" stand-alone legislation, including reimportation, Medicare price controls, and slashing the industry’s 12-year exclusivity on biologics.

 

Big Pharma can’t count on former conservative protectors. Republicans were sympathetic to its decision to "sit at the table," but grew furious when it engaged in active advocacy of the Democratic agenda. One House Republican staffer predicts the next time drug companies "ask us to stand in front of the train," the answer will be: "Since you were so happy to work with Democrats, call them. Go on, go: Call Rahm [Emanuel]. Call [Henry] Waxman."

 

Public anger over ObamaCare doesn’t help the industry’s reputation. Many Americans now view drug companies in the same light as "crony capitalist" banks or energy firms that turn to government to bolster the temporary bottom line. Pfizer’s stock price has been decent (due mostly to Mr. Kindler’s business restructuring), but the industry faces threats from a slowdown in innovation.

At least four times during the campaign, Obama argued against a spending freeze such as the one he is now promoting. I’m glad that Obama has come around on the issue. There is no shame in him changing his mind, but it raises the question of whether he is sincere this time.

The sad truth, however, is that his plan will save only $15 billion in 2011 and is actually less than he promised to cut on the campaign trial.

I will be happily surprised if he really achieves a spending freeze or a “net spending cut” as he promised during the campaign.

Here’s another example of a good intentions leading to bad (and easily foreseeable) policy: