Fanning the flames... (I am, that is.)

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/s/weeklystandard/20050512/cm_weeklystandard/aselectiveadherencetotradition

The guy lost me, is he for or against filbusters?

I read it as he is against filibusters of judicial nominees, as he sees it as a violation of precedent. He is also against impeachment of judges for rulings (as opposed to unethical conduct).

So someone educate me here: The "compromise" that McCain and his gang reached was a compromise because...?

It seems to me it just rolls back the clock and starts it again. The Dems give W's nominations an up/down, and the Reps don't abolish the filibuster.

Sure, a couple of the nominations don't get votes, but the whole point for both sides was to set this up strategically for the Supreme Showdown (TM), was it not?

Aren't we just back where we started? Not that that's a bad thing, necessarily....

From the reports I've read, you are dead on cowtown.

Imagine that...politicians do essentially nothing, both sides claim a win, and everyone pats themselves on the back.

And people wonder why the public is so apathetic about politics...

Well; it seems to me they tried a bit of compromise. The dems were going to filibuster all 7 or 8 of them and the republicans were going to get rid of the filibuster. Now the republicans get a vote on some of W's nominations and the dems get to keep the filibuster.

Though...the stipulations put on the use of it are hollow being that they are based on one politician "trusting" another.

I would like to look at it as a win - these fellows seem to have tried to be reasonable with eachother rather than being completely partisan. I really appreciated the words from the Senator from South Carolina (I think). He said something to the effect of "I know a lot of people at home are going to be angry with me." They worked together and came up with a very idealistic plan; I'm disappointed that neither of my senators were involved in the deal.