Filibuster

  Howard made this comment on an article about the use of filibuster

howard moore • the traditional use of Filibuster was viewed as a rare and an extreme measure. Perhaps the more famous instances involved issues like the moral abyss of slavery some of the incredible political compromises made to destroy millions of human lives and enrich a few others. Hindsight makes that choice clear - not so clear are such contemporary issues as- the so called family values, or a woman's right to control her body and reproductive process. So there may indeed be issues so vital that one Senator would feel compelled to halt all business until a certain result might be achieved. In an era of less flexible calendars, a filibuster could limit the work of a term, and recess powers come into play. The Senate has changed perhaps it is only nostalgia to think it was different, the late Senator Byrd spoke of it often as an article of faith, the comity among colleagues, respect given even to a bitter division. When i worked in the Senate as a young lawyer, i remember Senators Biden, Jacob Javits, Williams, Ted Kennedy, Claiborne Pell, Byrd, Stafford, Sam Nunn...perhaps my nostalgia but they were larger caliber people than those we have in this era-- and that is the difference, too many now simply owe their place to financial downpours from business lobbies and seem to stand for nothing else. In their hands, the filibuster is a way to appoint biased judges, start a war for profits, cut aid to poor and needy to lavish rich contributors. These are smaller people and the ageless tools of a great Democracy become like toys in the hands of mischievous children-- including the filibuster, the Thermopylae of a sometimes great deliberative body. HD Moore