Discussions With My Readership

I posted my last commentary on December 12, 2011. For those who may want to re-read it, it can be found under the title "The Deficit Reduction Committee I and II (Discussion)."

In that post Robert Malchman, Esq. of Brooklyn, NY reacted to a rebuttal that I had made to a column written by Charles Krauthammer with: "using your skills on someone like Klownhammer is like using a flamethrower on a strawman." In response thereto, I offered to consider a column by Ross Douthat entitled "An Argument Against Redistribution," which has more meat to it for rebuttal. However, I concluded with an invitation for additional comments, and many came. Therefore, before I venture on new ground, let me share with you the comments, some of which covered new grounds, and the exchanges to which they led.


Former Judge Edwin S. Bernstein Esq. of Boynton Beach Florida spoke to me on the telephone and said some things that disturbed me, prompting me to write the following rebuttal:

Apropos our telephone conversation, you aroused my curiosity about where my parents were born, causing me to use Google to see what I could find. I told you my mother was born in Zalishchyky, which could possibly be called a shtetl. According to its web site: it has a population of 13.000 people. The 1772 census listed 159 Jewish families in Zalishchyky. The Germans sent 200 Jews to the Kamionka (Kamyanka) labor camp; about 40 others were sent to a nearby army camp and forced to dig mass graves. Soon the other 800 were brought there and gunned down. 

           

However, my mother had left there with my grandmother when my mother was quite young and settled in Vienna, Austria. My mother was born in the late 19th century. During 1772 - 1918 Zalishchyky belonged to the Austrian empire (later Austrian-Hungarian empire when the double monarchy was introduced in Austria). This is important to me, because my mother always claimed that since at the time of her birth the city was part of Austria, she was born in Austria. But the US authorities classified her as Polish because at the time of desired immigration to the US (1938-1939) it was part of Poland. 

           

This was crucial and almost cost her life because the Austrian immigration quota was a favorable one, and if she had been classified Austrian she could have come to the US with her children in 1938, instead of having to wait until 1939 for her Visa, which she obtained while a refugee in Italy.

A similar story applies to my father, who was born in Lemberg, which was also part of Austria when he was born, but which was part of Poland in 1938. Its population in 1869 was 87,109 of whom 26,694 were Jews; in 1890 it was 127,943, including 36,130 Jews; in 1900 there were 44,801 Jews in a total population of 159,618, probably too large to be called a shtetl. 

           

Same immigration classification by the US. Had my mother not had a Visa forged, he would have died in the Buchenwald concentration camp.

           

With all our claims (US) of being hospitable to immigration, such quotas and exclusion acts make it a motley tale.

           

On our political discussion, I am very disappointed that you do not seem to be reading my blog postings. They would frequently prevent you from adopting "facts" that are wrong. I write them not to express opinions, which in most cases my readers share, or at least have similar opinions to mine, but to make sure my readers are familiar with relevant facts, toward which end I spend many hours doing research. 

           

For example I was bothered by some of the comments you made, e.g. that we ought to cut foreign aid, which arises from a neo-isolationism that has gained popularity both on the Left and Right. Please take the time to click on the following.

           

As you will readily see we are not a generous nation. Less than one per cent of our federal budget goes to foreign aid. US aid, as a percent of personal income, is second to last among wealthy nations. We give about 25 cents per American per year in foreign aid. Our total aid in dollar amount is $47.7 billion of which economic assistance is $33.9 billion, and that includes helping African babies avoid the scourge of Aids, Malaria, etc and helping hurricane, earthquake and tsunami victims. Would you argue we should not extend such help? Military assistance comes to $13.7 billion. Of that almost $4 billion goes to Israel and another $1.5 billion goes to Egypt to persuade it to keep the peace with Israel. See here.

           

As for interest on our debt, our treasury notes pay an astounding less that 1% on 30 year notes (see here) and less than 3% on average. See here.

           

As a result the present debt is not a significant problem, but projections into the future are troublesome. At the moment Republicans are using it as a wedge to try to destroy our safety net and regulatory structure. Every one of their budgets and proposals actually would increase the debt, not decrease it. (This is documented at length on my blog postings.)

           

Republicans keep arguing that the government should act more like a business, but not a single business functions without incurring debt, (which is why our banking system is so crucial and why it they had to be rescued) nor do individuals. Very few could buy a house without incurring debt, and most need to incur debt to buy large items such as a car. Borrowing, so as to do that which brings a bigger return than the interest on the debt, such as infrastructure, makes sense, always has, and always will.

           

On the other hand, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are not sustainable without some changes. Republican changes would amount to ending them, but Dems must make changes that will not necessarily be popular, but without changes these programs will not survive. I have written on this subject on my blog in the past, and will, in due course, discuss it in greater detail.

Some time later Bernstein commented on my post entitled "The Deficit Reduction Committee I and II (Discussion)" writing:

As always, I enjoy reading your blog and its comments. As I have said all too many times, our basic problem is the influence that money has on elected officials. This is especially true in Defense spending, where a grateful representative urges retaining unnecessary defense hardware to please his contributors - and his friends in Congress reciprocate. The cure is a Constitutional Amendment limiting contributions to elected officials. It is highly unlikely that this will occur. In its absence, perhaps the answer is something I have opposed in the past – term limits. 

To which I responded:

I hadn't planned to address the issue of money in politics in the near future, but since you raise it, and since it is one of the most corrosive influences in our government, I will address it soon, maybe in my next post.

                       

At this point let me just say that the problem is not just the "the influence that money has on elected officials." It has a much broader sweep than that. It infects our military procurement officers; it infects our regulatory agencies; it infects the staff of our officials; it effects our judges right up to the Supreme Court. You are Right that the cure is a constitutional amendment limiting contributions to elected officials, or at least giving Congress the power to do so. We need a Constitutional amendment stating that corporations are not persons, as persons are referred to in the Constitution, and that nothing in the Constitution shall limit Congress' power to regulate Corporations.

                       

We need an amendment that says money is not speech, and nothing in the Constitution shall limit Congress power to limit or regulate the collection, receipt, or expenditure of money in the political process, except the equal protection clause.

                       

Obama meant well when he decreed that lobbyists shall not serve in his Administration, but it should be the other way around. We need laws that forbid anyone who has served in the government from ever thereafter accepting employment from any individual or corporation who was effected by any act during such person's tenure in government, or from accepting any gratuity or fee from such person or persons for the remainder of their life.

                       

The delayed bribe for government services rendered is a greater problem that the money spent during campaigns.

                       

As for term limits, they accomplish nothing, and in fact are counter productive. The elimination of good people from government service by term limits is a great loss. It takes time to learn the job and term limits remove experienced people just when they become most effective, without any reason to believe that their successors will be an improvement. Stability is a valuable trait. I would, in fact, like to remove term limits from the Presidency.

                       

You are right it is all but impossible to accomplish these things, but they are so important that I think an effort in this direction is warranted. It may take years, or decades but it is so important, that the debate needs to begin. 

                       

How long did it take to gain women's suffrage? How long to emancipate African-Americans, and they are still not truly emancipated. 

If I address this as a full commentary, I will go into the many ways money corrupts, many of which are far from obvious.

                       

But it isn't only money; it is the gerrymander. We need federal rules that set the criteria for creating districts. Each with an equal population (within say 2%) contiguous, without dividing subdivisions such as towns or counties and providing that minorities be represented within (say 5%) of the population, and that the lines be drawn by computer based on these criterion.

                       

Of course, the filibuster must be abolished. It is ridiculous for us to be told that the vote was, e.g. 59 in favor - 39 opposed - the bill is defeated. Why do we have gridlock? It is the most important reason though there are others. The rule about not attaching non-Germaine items to a bill needs to be enforced.

Comments are welcome and will be distributed with attribution unless the writer requests that he/she not be identified.

The Vanishing Middle in America

I am increasingly disturbed by what I perceive as the vanishing middle in America. Of course, many will differ as to what constitutes the middle. The media, that institution so vital to our Democracy, increasingly caters to popular opinion, and too often fails in its responsibility to inform. Too often they seek to reinforce what might be called “the conventional wisdom” without questioning its validity or even its basis in fact.

Thus the conventional wisdom on the “middle” might be those many, who proudly claim to be independents, affiliate with no party and claim they vote on the merits of individual candidates, but when we examine their philosophical orientation we find they have none, and that too often they vote on the basis of the candidates charisma, charm, or whether they once met him and found him a “fellow well met”. It was this kind of thinking that brought many voters into the camp of George W. Bush because as was said at the time of his first election, by Chris Mathews of MSNBC among others, that he was a person one would feel more comfortable drinking beer with. Is this a sound criterion for choosing our President?

As can be seen from the positions of the political parties in the Congress they are now so far apart that the filibuster has become a matter of Republican Party policy and compromise has become a dirty word. The “conventional wisdom” is that the filibuster has always been used and that it protects the rights of the minority. But like so many concepts falling into the category of conventional wisdom it is a myth. To be sure the filibuster was at one time used by devoted segregationists and defenders of the right of states to in effect legalize lynching, but it was never used by any political party as a tool of party policy. Thus in 1957 Senator Strom Thurmond, at that time a segregationist Southern Democrat (later the candidate for President on the Dixiecrat slate and finally a Republican) conducted a one man filibuster, talking against a 1957 civil rights bill for 24 hours and 18 minutes.

But while that was dramatic it was also unusual, and Thurmond was unsuccessful. It was so unusual that there was only an average of one filibuster per Congress during the 1950s. But when the Republicans lost control of the Senate in the 110th Congress of 2007-2008, and even though they still had a Republican President who could veto legislation, they used a record 112 filibusters, and so far in this Congress they have already used this tactic over 40 times and we still have eight months to go.

See also this article in US News & World Report.

Republican voters are so unforgiving of compromise that George H.W. Bush was defeated for agreeing to a compromise with Democrats in order to reduce a looming budget deficit which called for both spending cuts and tax increases, thus violating the party’s commitment to never increasing taxes.

Thus with no middle ground between the parties those who claim to straddle between two irreconcilable philosophies can only be compared to a person with one foot on land and the other in a boat well away from the shore and moving further away. They can only drown. They may swing elections, but they will never bring about a positive legislative agenda for they lack a political philosophy.

There is a great misunderstanding about how much things have changed. I keep hearing about how President Lyndon Johnson was able to get Medicare passed with 68 votes, but bills that have the votes to pass attract more votes than they would otherwise get. That is still true today as can be seen from the passage of the jobs bill where only five Republican Senators voted to end the filibuster but eleven voted for the bill on final passage, the idea being to stop the bill if possible, but record a positive vote for a popular bill if it is going to pass anyway.

The fact is that Johnson only had 55 votes for Medicare that he could count on or to quote from a letter written at the time “Thus if all our supporters are present and voting we would win by a vote of 55 to 45.”

At that time it would have taken 67 votes to stop a filibuster, but the Republican Party never contemplated using that unsavory device. How times have changed!

And how has the media and this so called middle greeted this outrage. They have accepted Republican claims that it is the intent of the founders that it should take 60 votes to pass anything, or even to confirm a Presidential appointment, and that attempts to circumvent such obstructionism, whether by reconciliation, or any other means is in some way unsavory.

And some are even trying to pass of the Tea Partiers as a grass roots movement. Thus Dick Armey, a former Republican majority leader, who more than anyone else founded and is leading the movement tries to pass them off as, “These are folks who don't care about politics and don't like politics and don't like politicians. They're skeptical and cynical about all of them…” but ignores that these are the same people, or at least the political heirs to the John Birch Society or as one article described them, they are “white, male, older, less educated, Southern and religious…”.

But even now the movement is already the subject of a power struggle between Armey, who resists its nativists impulses as led by Tom Tancredo, or in Armey’s words, “… bungling the issue in a way that would alienate much of the electorate, by failing to keep a lid on such anti-immigrant crusaders as Tom Tancredo, a former Colorado congressman.” And Armey has good reason to be concerned about this for as George Will, one of the so-called intellectual spokesmen of the Right has pointed out, “Demography often is political destiny, and 47 percent of children under 5 are minorities. Hispanics are the largest and fastest-growing minority.”

So where do we find the true middle?

It may or may not surprise the reader to hear that I put a claim on that designation. For if the middle is to be found somewhere between FOX and MSNBC, I fit that description. But in order not to burden the reader with too much verbiage in one post, I will defer an exposition on this claim for a few days. In the meantime I hope the readers will take the time to read at least some of my source material.

Eating Crow

On January 21 2010 I posted a commentary on my blog entitled: "Lying pays off!!!!! Smears succeed!!!! Obstructionism is rewarded!!!!"

I received a comment from Bruno Lederer of Stamford, Conn. that read as follows:

“It is true that there were many smears and lies by the Republicans, and that that had some influence on the outcome in Mass. However, the main reason for the voter revolt there and in NJ and Va. was the use of federal money to rescue the automobile companies, AIG, and the banks, coupled with the unemployment situation in the country, and the fear that the health bill would result in more taxes. The trouble with Obama's approach was not that it was wrong, but that there was no real attempt to educate the voters as to the reason for his policies. I know that it does not seem fair for voters to penalize the democrats for policies that are much more reasonable than those of the Bush administration but that is the way voters are. The fact that special deals were made with the senators from Louisiana and Nebraska rubbed many voters the wrong way, and confirmed their negative view of Congress and politics. It is now imperative to fashion a health bill that will be acceptable to Olympia Snow, if possible, though the road will be much rougher now. Moreover, there is still time for Obama to try to educate the voters.”

When I published my commentary: “Doesn’t Anybody Really Care," I intended to use this comment in the body of my opinion piece, but in doing so inadvertently misquoted the comment and misrepresented it. This led to the following exchange between Bruno Lederer and me, which I am publishing in order to correct this misrepresentation.

Bruno wrote:

“Just two short comments in response to your recent misquote of my letter and mischaracterization of what it contained. Your changed "Republicans" to "Republican" in the first line, giving the impression that I was referring only to Sen. elect Brown as the person guilty of lies, smears etc. when I was referring to the Republican party as a whole. I also never said that the filibuster may have had some influence on the outcome in Mass. when I was not referring to the filibuster as influencing the election result, but the lies and smears of the Republicans. I also take exception to the statement that my letter shows no indication that I care, which I do, as you should know.”

To which I responded:

“I just spent quite a bit of time reviewing your complaints. At first I could not figure what their basis was, and then as I searched further I saw your point. You are right!

“I was careless, though none of it was intentional."

“The dropping of the s in Republicans was the result of a spelling and punctuation check, though that should not have applied to a quote. In adding a comma, I apparently substituted the comma for the s."

“As for my misquoting you on the filibuster when you referred to the "many smears and lies" again inexcusable carelessness, due to my equating them in my own mind."

“I will distribute this exchange, or any other statement you wish me to make, though I recognize that corrections never undo the damage done by the original misstatement."

“What bothered me about your comment was that I had written an angry commentary which can best be summarized by its title, "Lying Pays off!!! Smears Succeed!!! Obstructionism is Rewarded!!!" and you came back with what I considered to be a dispassionate analysis of the election. Of course, I know you care, but I don't think that one could tell by what you wrote. But in any case, I was not intending to attack you, but looking for a good lead in to the contention that we liberals should be able to muster at least as much anger and outrage as the Tea party people. 

“You may be right that Obama did not spend enough time educating the voters, but that is a difficult, if not impossible task, when you are being savaged by not only the opposition, but by the liberal organizations whose support you should be able to count on, not to speak of the media, whose job is to inform. How much space has been devoted in the press to the Democrats being blocked at every turn by an unprecedented use of obstruction, requiring unanimity on the Democratic part. As I pointed out, people like Krugman, actually lie (distort) in attacking Democrats, ignoring that compromises which they may disapprove of were unavoidable. MSNBC which is supposed to be a counterweight to Fox joins in the attack, distorting the realities of the political scene and demanding that the President undo acts of Congress by executive order - "Don't Ask, Don't Tell"; not defend acts of Congress though that is a duty of the Solicitor General, and take hopeless appeals where the law is settled. They demand that the previous Administration be prosecuted for war crimes in connection with torture.”

“It isn't the voters who infuriate me. It is the ‘liberal organizations, like moveon.org and the others mentioned…, as well as Krugman, Herbert, MSNBC, etc.” 

A Final Summing Up

It is seven days until the election. All the polls suggest a close election in the popular vote, but a landslide in the Electoral College. The polls are also encouraging in terms of numbers of seats to be picked up by Democrats, but Republicans have far from given up. They have tried so many tacks until now; they have tried lies, smears, McCarthyite guilt by association and now according to the Huffington Post even a distribution of a leaflet telling Democrats in Virginia that voting for them has been moved to Wednesday, November 5th.

After eight years of redistributing wealth upward to the top 2% of the electorate and nationalizing the banking system, they try to scare voters by charging that Obama will redistribute wealth from working Americans to a bunch of loafers, knowing full well none of this is true. They have seized on Obama’s promise to lower taxes for 95% of taxpayers when only 62% of households pay any income taxes. http://einshalom.com/archives/985 and they claim that this means that the remainder would actually get subsidies. What they are talking about sounds like a radical new scheme but it in fact is well imbedded in our tax code. It is called the earned income tax credit. It is such a radical idea that it was enacted during the Republican Administration of Richard Nixon and was supported by that apostle of the free markets Milton Friedman. The current credit has been expanded three times--once in 1986 during the Reagan Administration, again in 1993 under George Bush I, and again in 2001 in the Clinton Administration.

The idea of another expansion in an Obama Administration is hardly a radical idea but these naysayers try to make it appear so. Of course non-earners are not eligible because people without an income have no basis to file tax returns so this is not welfare for non-workers but an aid to the working poor.

They know that what Obama is talking about is reversing the trend of Americans working longer and harder with less and less reward for their labors. Since under Obama taxes will go down for all who make under $200,000 it is ludicrous to tell people at McCain rallies that they will be targeted, unless of course McCain has managed to assemble people at his rallies who make over $200,000. That may be true at his fundraisers, but it is unlikely at rallies of tens of thousands.

They also misrepresent the impact and the cost of the Obama tax plan a compared to the McCain one. The Washington Post has made a comparison. I set it forth below:

“According to a new analysis by the Tax Policy Center, a joint project of the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution, Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain are both proposing tax plans that would result in cuts for most American families. Obama's plan gives the biggest cuts to those who make the least, while McCain would give the largest cuts to the very wealthy. For the approximately 147,000 families that make up the top 0.1 percent of the income scale, the difference between the two plans is stark. While McCain offers a $269,364 tax cut, Obama would raise their taxes, on average, by $701,885 - a difference of nearly $1 million.”

The Washington Post has tables that illustrate the enormous differences. They are worth studying closely.

As can be seen, McCain’s plan, like Bush’s, gives more and more to the wealthiest while Obama gives relief to the vast majority of the non rich Americans.

Even more interesting is the cost to the treasury of the respective plans. According to the Tax Policy Center while “both candidates have at times stressed fiscal responsibility, their specific non-health tax proposals would reduce tax revenues by $3.6 trillion (McCain) and $2.7 trillion (Obama) over the next 10 years, or approximately 10 and 7 percent of the revenues scheduled for collection under current law, respectively. Furthermore, as in the case of President Bush's tax cuts, the true cost of McCain's policies may be masked by phase-ins and sunsets (scheduled expiration dates) that reduce the estimated revenue costs. If his policies were fully phased in and permanent, the ten-year cost would rise to $4.0 trillion, or about 11 percent of total revenues.

Thus as can be evident McCain’s plans are more expensive and favor the rich. Haven’t we had enough of these kinds of policies?

Not surprisingly as more and more voters understand the priorities of the candidates they are flocking to Obama and the Democrats in the House and the Senate.

But now in the closing days of the campaign we hear the final plea. We must not allow Democrats to win a victory that would actually be big enough to allow them to govern. During this past Congress, when Democrats after years in the wilderness, finally achieved a Majority Republicans made it a matter of party policy to routinely filibuster almost all bills put forth by Democrats. The media has given the impression that it is a Senate requirement that 60 votes are needed to pass legislation in the Senate but that is far from true. Until now filibusters were relatively rare and were used primarily to block civil rights legislation. Now, however, there have been 72 motions to stop filibusters so far in this first year of the 110th Congress. Compare this to 68 such motions in the full two years of the previous Congress, 53 in 1987-88, and 23 in 1977-78. In 1967-68, there were 5 such votes, one of them on a plan to amend cloture itself, which failed.

This is a deliberate calculated successful attempt to prevent the majority from doing the peoples business. It is deliberate action to enforce gridlock. And then during the campaign the have the nerve to denounce the Congress for getting nothing done.

The opposite is true. Democrats must be given large enough majorities to govern. If they have the power, responsibility will go with it. Gridlock cannot solve the recession, or the financial crisis or the health care crisis or any of the other problems that Democrats will inherit.

If we want our problems addressed we must not only get a new hand on the tiller we must have a captain with a crew so that they can steer the ship of state.

The Filibuster and The Nuclear Option

There has been much in the media about the filibuster regarding judicial nominations and the desirability or lack thereof with regard to judicial nominations. I believe this misses the crucial point. On this point both sides are insincere.

Historically, Republicans have favored the filibuster and Democrats have opposed it. Therefor there are both being at least inconsistent in their present positions, if not actually hypocritical.

A more important point, however is at stake which is not being widely discussed. Senate Rules say that debate can only be halted by 60 votes. Republicans want to change this as to confirmation of judges only. That is their right! But it is their right to do it only within the procedures of the Senate which provides:

RULE 43
Suspending and Amending Rules
Any Rule of the Senate or severable portion of a rule of the Senate may be suspended by unanimous consent of the Senate. Without unanimous consent one day's previous notice shall be given of a motion to suspend any of the rules or severable portion thereof. A motion to suspend shall require a vote of two-thirds (2/3) of the membership of the Senate.

Any permanent amendment, rescission, or repeal of any of the Senate rules shall require a two-thirds (2/3) vote of the total membership of the Senate. However, from the convening of the 2006 legislative session through the second Thursday of the 2006 legislative session, any permanent amendment, rescission, or repeal of any of the Senate rules may be made by adoption of a Senate Resolution that has been referred to and has received a favorable report from the Rules Committee.

The Clerk of the Senate shall have these rules recorded in a permanent book which shall be kept at all times in the Senate Chamber. All permanent changes in the rules after they have been adopted shall be recorded in a Permanent Rule Book and certified by the Clerk of the Senate. These rules shall remain in full force and effect until the conclusion of the terms for Senators or until the Rules are amended, suspended, or repealed by a vote of two-thirds (2/3) of the membership of the Senate prior thereto.

Last Updated: 1/12/05 4:27 PM

Then how can the Republican majority change the rules by majority vote? The answer is by a sham interpretation of the rules by the Vice-President followed by a sham upholding of a ruling by a majority of the Senate.

RULE 7 A.
Question of Order
Appeal from President's Decision

If a Senator in speaking, or otherwise, violates the Rules of the Senate, the presiding officer shall, or any member may, by raising a point of order, call him to order; and when a member is called to order by the President or under a point of order, he or she shall sit down and may not proceed without leave of the Senate, unless the President takes the point of order under advisement. The President may call for the Sense of the Senate on any question of order. Every question of order must be decided by the President, without debate, and Senators shall have the right to appeal the decisions of the President to the full Senate. When the decision of the President is appealed, the President Pro Tempore or his or her designee shall preside and the President shall retire from the chamber during the pendency of the appeal and the Senate's debate and action on the motion to appeal. The question before the Senate shall be "Shall the ruling of the President be overridden?" and after not more than thirty (30) minutes, fifteen (15) minutes for and fifteen (15) minutes against, of debate it shall be decided by a majority vote of the membership.

This of-course assumes that the ruling of the chair shall be made in good faith. But in this case the ruling would fly in the face of the clear rules of the Senate and therefor would be a violation of law and ethics. It is hard to believe that there are not five Republicans who believe in the Rule of Law and are willing to stand up to uphold that rule of law. To do otherwise is to open a Pandora's box. Also the VP has said that he would vote to break a tie. Since he must retire from the chamber it is hard to see how he could do that within the rules but it appears that no rules and no laws are any longer binding upon this runaway Republican majority.

Here is what two former Republican Senators writing in the Wall Street Journal had to say on the subject. What follows is an excerpt:

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Don't Go Nuclear
By Jim McClure and Malcolm Wallop 
15 March 2005 

The United States Senate is heading toward a crisis of sorts over the Democratic minority's use of extended debate to prevent votes on many of President Bush's most important judicial nominations. Together -- and as Republicans -- we served a combined 36 years in the Senate. We are no strangers to the filibuster and, in the past, did not hesitate to employ or to support that instrument on extraordinary occasions. .... it does not call for what is being referred to as a "nuclear option" from the Senate majority leader.

Over the past year, that "option" has been variously, and vaguely, defined. In his opening remarks to the Senate on Jan. 4, however, Sen. Bill Frist made things suddenly clear. Read carefully: "I reserve the right to propose amendments to Senate Rule XXII [concerning extended debate] and do not acquiesce to carrying over all the rules from the last Congress." The first clause is innocuous; every senator has the right to propose rules changes. But the second clause is dynamite, capable of blowing out the foundations of the Senate itself. It means the majority leader will eventually propose, against history and common sense, that the Senate is not a "continuing body." Or, to be precise, a continuing body with continuing rules, for there is the heart of the matter.

Some of the public may need to be reminded that, when the 109th Congress convened in January, only about one-third of the Senate was sworn in, namely, those members elected or re-elected last November. The other two-thirds of the membership did not stop being senators after last year's adjournment, and they did not mysteriously lose the body of rules and precedents under which the Senate operates from year to year and, ultimately, from generation to generation.

Sen. Frist's carefully crafted remarks suggest an intention to ignore all that by implying that his acquiescence is needed to "carry over all the rules from the last Congress." Without those rules, how does the Senate decide anything? How does it change the rules? How does it cut off a judicial filibuster? By simple majority vote...

All this -- in effect, turning the Senate into a high-end version of the House of Representatives -- is too high a price to pay in order to stop Senate Democrats' abuse of the filibuster on judicial nominations. It is disheartening to think that those entrusted with the Senate's history and future would consider damaging it in this manner. The alternate "nuclear" strategies under discussion are also problematic. A Constitutional point of order, for example, would, according to Senate tradition, be referred to the full Senate, where it is debatable (i.e., filibusterable). The only other option is for the chairman to rule, without citing the Constitution, that judicial nominations cannot be filibustered. That course would have no basis in either law or Senate rules. (emphasis added)

At this point, no one knows how the "nuclear option" drama will play out, but we would respectfully offer to senators, both Republican and Democratic, a bit of back-country wisdom: When you find a bear in your cabin, it's not smart to try to burn him out.

Messrs. McClure and Wallop, Republicans, are former senators from Idaho and Wyoming, respectively.