https://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2017/04/03/the-unreported-democrat-implosion/Gorsuch Vote Reveals the Unreported Democrat Implosion
Apr 3, 2017
RUSH: First on the Gorsuch nomination, the Democrats, Chuck Schumer is confirmed now to have enough votes to stop the confirmation of Judge Gorsuch without the nuclear option. So it is reported. The news is that Judge Gorsuch will not get the 60-vote threshold to go to a full vote on the confirmation. We’ve got reports of some Democrats voting to confirm him. I think Susan Collins has signaled to the Republicans she’s gonna vote against him, which, believe me, makes no sense, just absolutely no sense.
Mitch McConnell assured everybody on Meet the Press yesterday that Gorsuch is gonna get confirmed and it’s gonna happen by Friday, and that means if they have to pull the nuclear option, they’re gonna do it, which the Democrats know. It is silly for the Democrats to force the nuclear option on this nominee. I tell you, folks, I know this goes against the grain of the daily soap opera narrative. I mean, when you turn on mainstream news, what I’m about to say goes against what anybody concludes watching just a few minutes of news.
I think things are imploding on the Democrats, and I actually think this is one of the reasons why the media is so desperate, because despite all the minutia and detail here, in the real world, the things the Democrat Party believes in are failing all over the world, not just here in the United States. The Obama administration was an economic disaster, was an economic failure. Liberalism, socialism around the world is imploding.
The Democrats are losing power in every election. And I think that’s part of the panic. They want us to believe that the behavior and panic is rooted in an absolute outraged offense over this president that we have, this is just unacceptable and some maniac like Trump is so out of the ordinary, out of the norm, has to be stopped. I don’t think that’s what it is. I mean, it’s part of it. But I think there’s a much larger panic that is taking over the Democrat Party. And it’s gonna implode on ’em.
And I’ll tell you, one of the areas it’s gonna implode is this entire effort they have made to tie Trump’s election to Russian malfeasance or hacking. That is about to blow up in their face. In fact, it may of already have. It’s just that you don’t find this news yet in much of the mainstream media.
Pulling out all the stops here on Gorsuch politically makes no sense, but it does make sense if the Democrats’ lunatic maniac base is demanding it and threatening never to send the Democrats any money ever again. Then that would explain why they’re willing to fall on the sword here, because this is not the nominee that you want to force the nuclear option on. Because once the nuclear option is pulled, it’s pulled. And once the rule is changed, it’s changed. It’s not changed per nominee. It’s changed. And if they force this, then all they’re gonna need in future Supreme Court nominees is 51 votes.
Trump could nominate somebody they literally despise, somebody that could be the most outrageous choice in the world, and they’re not gonna be able to stop that nominee if they force McConnell to pull the nuclear option.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: We start on the phones today in Oxford, Ohio. This is Bill. Bill, great to have you. How are you doing, sir?
CALLER: I’m doing outstanding, Rush. How about yourself?
RUSH: Fine and dandy. Great to have you here.
CALLER: I got a quick question real quick, like Mr. Snerdley said. My question is, why is everybody so scared of the filibuster? Why don’t they just let the Democrats get on the floor and talk and talk and talk?
RUSH: That’s not what a filibuster is. That’s not the kind of filibuster we’re talking about.
CALLER: It’s not?
RUSH: No. A filibuster is a rule in the Senate that essentially says anything has to get 60 votes before it can proceed to the Senate for a debate, either a piece of legislation or a Supreme Court nominee. Now, Harry Reid triggered the nuclear option on lower-court nominees and appellate court nominees to get rid of the filibuster, so now for those nominees, those judges, it only takes 51 votes. The kind of filibuster you’re talking about would say the Democrats would eventually wear out, they’d have to take a potty break and give it up and the Republicans would eventually get the floor back. That’s not what we’re talking about here.
CALLER: Okay. So I had just a misunderstanding, then.
RUSH: You know what? But I’m glad you called because a lot of people do. This is another one of these — I had the same exact reaction you did, when I first started studying or learning about this, and I heard the filibuster used, but I never saw anybody on the floor of the Senate talking? What the heck was this filibuster? And it was explained to me they allow for somebody to pretend to be occupying the floor, and instead of that, they substitute a requirement. It was done to protect minorities from overreach by the majority.
It’s not in the Constitution. It is a Senate rule that was established some years ago. And very simply, it just says that, be it a piece of legislation or in this case a Supreme Court nominee, there must be 60 votes to stop debate. The debate is what you think the filibuster is. When you hear this, you think, “Oh, there’s countless people on the floor of the Senate just talking and reading and saying nothing, just wasting time.” They suspend with that. They just assumed that would happen. They don’t put that requirement, and instead 60 votes are needed, pure and simple.
The nuclear option is eliminating that 60-vote requirement and returning it to simple majority, which is 51. Harry Reid did that so that Obama could pack the lower courts. Obama’s appellate nominees and district court nominees only needed 51 votes. Harry Reid did that so that the Republicans, who were in the minority, could not stop, that Democrats — no party has had 60 votes in the Senate in a long time. That’s one of the reasons the number was arrived at. So Harry Reid said, “You know what? I’m not even gonna let the filibuster play out here.” He changed the rules.
That’s what all of this handwringing is about now, should the Republicans do what Harry Reid did and change it to include Supreme Court nominees? And of course the purists are saying, “We can’t do that. That would be tearing up the rules of the Senate, that would be eliminating centuries, years of tradition.” No, it wouldn’t. When Harry Reid changed the rules nobody was wringing their hands. Nobody on the left, nobody in the media thought, “Oh, my God, what’s the Senate doing?” Nobody thought that. They praised Harry Reid for a brilliant political maneuver.
Now that Mitch McConnell might do it, now everybody, “You can’t do that. You can’t destroy the Senate that way. That would destroy the Senate.” It’s already been destroyed, if that’s what defining destroying the Senate is. Now, as to your other question, let me tell you why the timing here may matter. The second and third week of April is when the Supreme Court announces cases that they are going to take for the next session, which will start after the summer recess. The court comes back around late September, early October. They start ostensibly with the fiscal year of the federal government’s budget.
So they are gonna be announcing in the next three weeks the cases they’re going to be taking. That would mean that if McConnell is right and he’s gonna have Gorsuch confirmed by Friday, that means Gorsuch will have sway on those decisions. I think the truth of the matter is — and your call kind of illustrates it — I don’t think the majority of Americans care how Gorsuch gets through the Senate.
If they need to nuke, nuke. If they have to trigger the nuke, do it! “But, Rush, but, Rush, the Democrats will get away with it ’cause of the media, but they’ll skewer McConnell.” Look, the day has to come, doesn’t it? I look heavenward, I pray, I pray, can the Republicans just one day do something not out of fear? But McConnell has pretty much committed himself to this, if he has to he’s gonna do what it takes.
Here’s the thing about this though, Bill. Once the rule is changed, it’s changed. They don’t just change it for a nominee. That’s why the Democrats doing this is very odd because the odds are that Gorsuch is gonna be confirmed anyway, so why go through this when he’s not really objectionable? The only reason he’s being so objected is because the Democrat donors, the lunatics in their base are telling these guys if they don’t stop this Gorsuch guy, they could forget about getting any donor money.
I heard Dianne Feinstein today, you know, the Senate Judiciary Committee is gonna vote this week, and they all get to make a statement, and DiFi, the chairman of the Democrats or ranking member, was reading it. She didn’t even know in her heart why she opposes the guy. It was embarrassing to listen to her go through this. It was clear that somebody had written it for her and she was not doing a very good job of reading it. Anyway, I’m out of time here. There’s your answer. This is not this is not the kind of filibuster where you remember Rand Paul and Ted Cruz talking for days on the Senate floor.
