Down with the "Kumbaya Contingent"

Boyden Gray sets out the facts about the constitutional option in a USA Today piece; correctly, he notes that under "fast track" authority, trade agreements cannot be filibustered. To that, I would add that budget reconciliation bills likewise cannot be filibustered -- and if senators must vote on how to spend our money, it doesn't seem too unfair to require them to vote on our judges.

A piece in the Kansas City Star (registration required, and it's a pain), tries to suggest that Bob Dole has piped up with an assertion that a "compromise" can be reached. Not so fast. Read on, and you learn what Dole actually said -- and what he writes here, in The New York Times -- is that Republicans would be perfectly justified in resorting to the constitutional option if the need arises.

Thank Heaven. Because Lincoln Chaffee-style kumbaya rhetoric isn't helpful to the Republican cause (not that Chaffee seems to care). Not to compare Democrats to Saddam Hussein -- but to use the metaphor, Republicans like Chaffee/McCain/Hagel et al, who keep hopes of a "compromise" alive, are acting like the UN back in 2003. If there were any chance of the stand-off being resolved amicably, by giving the Democrats hope that they can avoid a day of reckoning, this "kumbaya contingent" only reduces the likelihood of a "peaceful" resolution -- and helps the MSM portray straight shooters like Boyden Gray as "outside the mainstream".