McClatchy Gets The GOP Plan

Somebody in the Village is actually paying attention to the GOP Plan to shut down the government and blame the Democrats, and for once it's not just Stewart and Colbert.  McClatchy's David Lightman:

Senate Republicans are using the filibuster to limit and often derail Democrats' initiatives, paralyzing the Senate and making it nearly impossible to accomplish even the most routine matters.

The filibuster strategy "makes the Senate dysfunctional," said Mark Strand, the president of the Congressional Institute, a nonpartisan research group. That, in turn, blocks the Obama administration's agenda, but it also sours public opinion on Washington, with polls showing clear public disdain for Congress in particular. Republicans think voters will reward them for that in November.

However disruptive it is to governance, their extensive use of the filibuster — extended debate to block a decisive vote — could prove to be a valuable campaign asset this fall. Democrats used similar tactics in 2006 and won enough seats to gain a Senate majority. Now Republicans hope it's their turn.

Since Barack Obama became president nearly 13 months ago, Republicans have made it clear that 60 votes — the number needed to cut off debate in the 100-member Senate — are required to pass not only major Democratic programs, but also many routine proposals. (Democrats controlled 60 Senate seats from July until last week, when Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass., was sworn in.)

"Republicans have ratcheted use of the filibuster up to completely unheard of levels. Look at the things that the House (of Representatives) has passed that can't make it through the Senate. The list just keeps growing," said Norman Ornstein, an expert on Congress at the American Enterprise Institute, a center-right policy organization.

The GOP Plan is working because the American people don't know how a filibuster works.  They don't know how a filibuster works because the Village refuses to tell them that Republicans are blocking the bill.  This allows the GOP to stop the Democrats from being able to pass legislation while at the same time complaining that the Democrats can't get anything done, even though they are in charge.

Some Village outlets will mention that the "measure needs 60 votes to pass", but not why.  For once, we finally see a news organization not only telling us why (the Republicans can and still block everything in an unprecedented move to do so) but the full reasons behind it: that the GOP believes by neutering the Democrats' ability to govern and preventing them from being able to repair the damage that the Republicans did to our country, they can get power back.

The GOP Plan always had the component of a compliant press that would explain things from the GOP angle and allow them to continue to block legislation through ignorance and apathy.  Finally somebody's making a dent in that.

It will not be enough however unless the Democrats attack on this at every turn.