Comments

1
It's not just him, it's the entire Vermont delegation.

Two Senators and One Congressman.
2
I know I need at least eight houses.
3
Ha ha! Yeah! Go, buddy!
4
bernie for president! bernie for president!!!!
5
You can watch the filibuster live on c-span: http://www.c-span.org/Watch/C-SPAN2.aspx
6
Bernie Sanders is my new boyfriend.
7
Brave man
8
God bless that man. Seriously.
9
learn something, Harry Reid.
10
Sen. Sanders is going old-school on two fronts.
1: A non-'procedural' filibuster.
2: Principles.
11
I emailed Senator Murray and Senator Cantwell and asked them to help him. He's great, I'd vote third party if he ran for President.
12
This is wonderful! Almost five hours. He sounds great. http://www.cspan.org/Watch/C-SPAN2.aspx
13
Last I heard, Jim DeMint was thinking about filibustering as well, albeit for diametrically opposing reasons. Now that would be hilarious to see paired with Sanders.
14
I thought you had to convert to a hotel after you owned just four houses...
15
@12 Thanks for the link! This is epic. He's doing a great job communicating on top of it, too. Go, Bernie!!!
16
so it is the Liberals who play the dreaded Filibuster Card....

you girls are so inept it makes our teeth hurt.

shooting down Obama's plan will be great for us.

When the new Congress comes in in a few weeks they can extend the tax cut and leave out all the goodies that were there for the left (buy bye unemployment extension...)

see you in 2011......
17
@14 - You have to spread your houses evenly among your properties, so it takes either eight or twelve houses before you have to/get to upgrade to a hotel.
18
Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha awesome.
19
His speech is riveting. So how does this work? How long does he have to go on for?
20
@16: The tax cuts "sunset" (i.e. expire) at the end of this year. So the new Congress will not be able to extend them. Sorry. Dipshit.
21
@17 anyone ever notice the hotels are Red while the houses are Green?

And what ever happened to the Apartment Buildings?

@19 when he gets tired, Patty will take over so he gets a breather.
22
Oh wait, I just read the story. So he's just doing it to make a point, then? Sorry, I'm Canadian; can someone please explain how this is supposed to play out?
23
I've never been prouder to be from VT. Go Bernie!!!
24
@21 Is this true? I'd love to be able to verify that.
25
@22: A filibuster is a procedural maneuver (or maneuvre, since you're Canadian) to prevent a piece of legislation from coming up for a vote. It requires 60 votes to stop the Senator from speaking as long as he chooses, which is why even when one party has a majority in the Senate (as the Democrats currently have) you continually hear they "didn't have the 60 votes they needed." While a simple majority is all that's necessary for legislation to pass, the 60-vote supermajority has become a de facto requirement because of the prevalence of filbustering in recent years.

What Sanders is attempting is to kill this legislation by preventing it from ever coming up for a vote.

26
@22 nobody knows.

The last time they did this most of the people posting on here were just glimmers in their parent's playground antics.

@25 and he's succeeding. Told you the real filibuster existed.
27
@25 also, technically, the Senate Majority Leader can move something to the floor with a straight majority vote, but he has to have guts.

Which Reid doesn't.
28
@12 thanks for the link, this is amazing!
29
It's awesome. I've been following his twitter account and #filibernie (which is itself of awesome).
30
@25: Thanks, Proteus! But this is the part of the story I was confused about:

"whatever Sanders does, the Senate isn't scheduled to hold any votes until Monday, so its practical effects may not amount to much."

But it sounds like you're saying he can resume on Monday and continue to block the vote? The TPM story says the rules have changed. I'm wondering what the rules are.
31
And you're cheering this, Dan? He's not just filibustering the tax cut, he's filibustering the DADT repeal bill that Lieberman and Collins submitted yesterday. The lame duck session is the last chance to repeal DADT for at least two years and Sanders is pissing the time away.

A tax cut will just come up again next session when there are dozens more Republicans and Obama has less leverage to negotiate a 2nd stimulus into the comprimise. But the chances for a DADT repeal are shrinking with each passing hour.
32
@30: I believe the rules to which the article refers are regarding what are known as "procedural" filibusters; In recent years the practice of filibustering has become so commonplace that it is now unusual for a Senator to do what Sanders is doing, actually speaking on the floor of the Senate for hours or days on end. These days, the threat of doing so is normally all that is required.
33
@31 lol - you actually believed that was going to happen?

You're just so ... precious.
34
I'm in love.
35
Wow.

While I'm not happy about allowing tax breaks for the wealthy to continue, I'm undecided whether, as a negotiated piece of a larger package, whether I can live it it. But I'm nevertheless impressed with Sanders' determination to shed light on it to the American public and add to the debate.

Why is it when Dems (and indepedents) fillibuster, they actually have to talk forever, while Republicans just have to sign their name to a piece of paper?
36
Amazing, thanks for the C-Span link. It's wonderful to see a senator on the left actually standing up for the mainstream liberal principles that got a (spineless) democratic majority elected.
37
And he's just hit seven hours.

I'm thoroughly impressed with this Senator. Damn.
38
@16- Holy shit you're ignorant. Do you know how much crap has been "filibustered" lately by the GOP? They just did it the new-fangled way instead of actually putting in the work.

Liberals actually work, you see.
39
@35 -- Look it up sometime. Technically (or at least historically), this is how a filibuster is supposed to work.
40
I just don't understand the Republicans these days. They get weirder and weirder (emboldened by spineless opposition). Preserving tax cuts for the rich is their top priority, and they're willing to sacrifice 9/11 health benefits at the altar. They like to sell themselves as the Freedom Apple Pie Liberty Cut-The-Deficit Party of the Mainstream, yet they're willing to sell out everything else to preserve expensive tax cuts for the financial elite.

Note to Spineless Dems: If a Republican candidate in a future campaign calls you "elite" and sneers, remind them that screwing over sick 9/11 rescue workers to protect healthy rich people is the definition of elitism. Honestly, what would the Republicans have said in, say, 2002 if a Congressman tried to hold up support for 9/11 relief workers? Would that person have even been electable? Now we've got a whole party doing it, and it's the same party that liked to take credit for anything positive that came after 9/11 (from GW Bush on down to Mayor Giuliani).

That's the long way of saying, Go Bernie Sanders!!
41
I;m not as opposed to the tax deal as some of you. Sure It would have been better not have to extended the bush cuts to the upper income brackets, but if you look at the breakdown of how the bills costs are, Obama got 87% of what he wanted (middle-class tax cuts, payroll tax cut, unemployment insurance extension) and the Repugs for 13% of what they screamed for. I think actually Obama snookered them and they are starting to realize it; look how Demint, Palin, etc are all opposed. Go read this artcle:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/con…

43
@41/42 wrong. As all the comments on that piece show, nobody buys that argument.

Try this one instead, cause it's your turn now that Bernie showed you how to do it:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact
44
Rock. Star.
45
20

oh goodie.
we can pass some new deeper tax cuts.....
46
@33 So rather than trying to use our new Republican ally on DADT repeal to garner cloture votes, let's just waste time on the Senate floor? If the Democrats are going to screw the GLBT community like they usually do, we might as well make it easier for them, right?
47
Apparently, the speech is the biggest topic on Twitter today and the second worldwide.

This might not have been a filibuster, but Senator Sanders used his position perfectly to get the facts out to the American people. And Americans were paying attention, as were a lot of people around the world. That's worth a lot, especially given the fact that our media does everything it can to hide those facts, to lie to Americans, to prevent them from ever seeing how much they're getting screwed over. If Americans really knew the facts, they'd be in the streets, like they were in England and Greece. They would completely and totally reject trickle down, supply-side bullshit once and for all and demand real reform.

We need a hundred Sanders in the Senate.
48
@45: Except that you guys don't have a majority in the Senate, and have no way to override a veto.
49
so wait. Dems/liberals/lefties (including me) were all about banning the evil filibuster forever and ever, but this Sanders stunt is ok? aren't we looking like ridiculous hypocrites here?
50
Onion--this wasn't a filibuster. This was a speech. As has been noted in the comments several times, no actual senate business was postponed for this. Basically, Sanders used the fact that all speeches made on the senate floor are telecast nationwide on C-span to allow him a platform to present the case for sanity. I personally don't have, and have never had, a problem with a filibuster. It's a tool, like any other, what matters is what you do with it. But even if you personally hate the things, this wasn't one.
51
@49: He's filibustering one thing because he has a huge ideological problem with it and wants to get the word out.
Republicans have threatened to filibuster EVERYTHING, not to try and convince other legislators, but just to stop anything from being accomplished.
52
@49 - he's an independent, asswipe: VT(I) Congress's only true statesman, aka america's only real legislative representative, and I'm not the only one who thinks so.

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