A reader who identifies as Quickwrit posted the following comment about the filibuster. For most of our history, debates in the Senate could be used to delay consideration of a bill, even to kill it. But the filibuster was not written into law until 1917.
Our Founding Fathers would agree that “contemptible” aptly describes Manchin, Sinema, and each of the other Democrats who oppose ending the filibuster because our Founding Fathers during the 1787 Constitutional Convention flatly rejected the idea of allowing a minority to block the will of the majority by filibustering — that’s because our well-read Founding Fathers knew how the practice of the filibuster in the Roman Senate had eventually brought down the Roman Republic by allowing a minority of reactionary senators to block the will of the majority of Romans in a process that ultimately led to one-person rule by dictatorial emperors.
Founding Father and President James Madison whom we revere as “The Father of the Constitution” disgustedly called the filibuster extortion, pointing out that “In all cases where justice or the general good might require new laws to be passed…the fundamental [majority rule] principle of free government would be reversed. It would no longer be the majority that would rule: The power would be transferred to the minority…to extort.”
Alexander Hamilton angrily denounced the filibuster, declaring that “To give a minority a negative upon the majority is…to subject the sense of the greater number to that of the lesser…[resulting in] contemptible compromises of the public good.”
Two words of our Founding Fathers that stand out in regard to how they felt about the filibuster are: “EXTORT” and “CONTEMPTIBLE”.
Anyone who supports the filibuster betrays our Founding Fathers and the majority-rule system of government that they established in our Constitution.
The Daily Poster, founded by David Sirota (former speechwriter for Senator Bernie Sanders, said this about the filibuster:
As Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) defend the filibuster and block voting rights legislation, corporate media keeps repeating the lie that the two are doing so because they care deeply about Senate rules and tradition. By doing so, news outlets are refusing to admit the obvious: Sinema and Manchin are just the latest of the Senate’s many corrupt puppets who want to help corporate lobbyists preserve their legislative kill switch.
Amid the high-concept discourse about voting rights, historical precedent, and The Greatest Deliberative Body In The World™, big business has been telegraphing what the filibuster actually is. It is not about democracy or minority rights or any other maudlin subplot from a West Wing episode — it is about something much more raw and ugly. It is about giving capital veto power over the economy, as the most powerful corporate lobby group in Washington effectively admits.Tip Jar
Indeed, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has publicly opposed filibuster reform for this very reason. Last year, the organization gloated to its members that the rule would prevent Democrats from passing a minimum wage hike or legislation to make it easier for workers to form a union.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
So, I am not alone in appreciating the QuickWit of QuickWrit!
The “Is” have it
LOL
Posted senate history of the filibuster is of interest:
https://www.senate.gov/about/powers-procedures/filibusters-cloture/overview.htm
Sinema and Manchin are just the latest of the
many corrupt puppets starring in the vitriolic
political theater, an enthralling puppet
show for diehard believers and perpetrators
of the perpetually rejuvenated illusions
(myths) surrounding the gov.
The “facts on the ground”, the “proof in
the pudding”, continue to reveal the
interests being served. YET a patina
of legitimacy, the make-believe notions
of power establishing institutional
mechanisms, to CONTROL itself,
remains.
“One of the saddest lessons of history
is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long
enough, we tend to reject any evidence
of the bamboozle. We’re no longer
interested in finding out the truth.
The bamboozle has captured us.
It’s simply too painful to acknowledge,
even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken.”
That is a great quote, NoBrick. I googled & learned it’s from a Carl Sagan book “The Demon-Haunted World”. Prescient.
Let’s all learn from the wisdom of our Founding Fathers that democracy is NOT served while the Filibuster exists in the Senate. It’s not a part of the Constitution and needs to go ASAP. Both sides have used it, but it just does not encourage true democracy if a minority can stifle a majority. Make our Reps & Senators debate the issues and cast their votes & the majority wins. Sorry, but that’s the only way we can make this Democratic Republic work, even tho we’ll never get 100% consensus on anything. Until all of our citizens understand that, and vote in people who also get it, we will never progress as a Democracy.
Amen
Reblogged this on Lloyd Lofthouse and commented:
This re-blogged post explains why the FILIBUSTER most go.
The Republicans cannot simply gerrymander their way forward. The tide of change, demographically and among young people, is POWERFULLY against them. This is their do-or-die moment. They are going to have ONE SHOT at it, and they know it. Unfortunately, too many Democrats don’t. Haven’t gotten the memo. The only way that they will continue to exist as a significant party 20 years from now is if they seize this moment and rise Phoenix-like from the ashes of democracy. Listen carefully to their leaders and their pundits. They know this.
They have to seize and establish enough control that they can suppress voting rights and dissent in really big ways (think Trump’s desire to sic the military on protestors, stopped only because Milley and Esper and, eventually, even Barr, refused to play along) and start indoctrinating a new generation of young people in a nationalist/fascist ideology. This is their one show (2022-24), and they know it. Otherwise, they are history.
Their continued existence as a party depends upon, REQUIRES, shifting to overt fascist rule. Otherwise, a few years on, they are toast.
Trump loved to say, in his racist way, “The blacks, they love Trump.” He knew thi4s was bs, and so does everyone else in his party. 93 percent of black people voted against him. And 60-70 percent of young people say they would vote for a Socialist presidential candidate. The Pugs know that they can no longer rely on the ignorance of the populace, on manufactured consent, on distracting entertainments and apathy. They must move now to establish fascist control, or they go extinct. All their beautiful rapaciousness, washed away by a tide they have not been able to control.
Trump, who has no editor, said this out loud recently, repeating the white replacement theory stuff and saying that unless something is done, the near future will see “The end of the Republican Party,” and “You won’t have a country [run by Capitalist con men] anymore.” These people are well aware that the demographic trends and the youth of the country are against them. Tucker (spell that with an F) is right about this. So is Trump.
This just in: Russia pledges to continue operation of pipeline of gas to Donald Trump even if forced by the West to invade Ukraine.
that would be “unnatural gas”
hmm, I think there might be some funny bathroom humor about to be revealed… SDP?
Congress is far removed from the Founding Fathers at this point. Recent Supreme Court nomination hearings were plenty proof enough of that. The Constitutional Convention resulted in plenty of breaks for the minority. It wasn’t enough for 21st century plutocrats. There is no rule of law today, just lawless rulers.
Well said, LCT!
Belated thanks for this, Diane and Quickwrit. My position on filibuster up to this point was just a hazy notion that it looked like one of those rule changes that could be misused by either side. Now I am informed—perhaps even savvy 😉.
It is my understanding that the filibuster is not an actual law, but more an agreed-upon rule.