From our own Charley Richardson
AS A cancer patient, I have been watching the debate in Washington around health care reform with great interest. I am dismayed at the threat of 41 senators holding the nation hostage and blocking needed reform. But I am even more dismayed at the willingness of the Democratic leadership to bow to this small group. Make them filibuster, I say. Not the false, polite “procedural filibuster’’ of counting votes, but the real filibuster, in which senators have to speak continuously and refuse to give up the floor. I relish the idea of the American people, who in overwhelming numbers want health care reform, watching the Republicans and their allies on C-SPAN tying up the Senate, blocking not only health care reform but all legislation from moving forward. How long do we really think it would take for the voters to rise up and force the Republicans to back off? People are dying while senators play nice. Make the oppositionists expose themselves to the American public. Bring back the real filibuster. Charley Richardson |
