alt Hacker News> Edit: When the democrats removed the filibuster for judicial confirmations they started us on this path. Predictably the Republicans responded by including the scotus. That was the end of an independent judiciary. It just took a while for it to be sufficient to kill democracy. And to be clear, no ratings agency in the world still considers the US a democracy. At years end it will be an official downgrade from flawed democracy to electoral autocracy or competitive authoritarian state.
While this is technically true, it conveniently ignores why the democrats removed the filibuster which is that:
“In the history of the Republic, there have been 168 filibusters of executive and judicial nominees. Half of them have occurred during the Obama administration — during the last four and a half years,” Reid said.
As always Republicans cause a crisis and then take it to the extreme and Democrats usually end up taking the blame.
Not that they are blame free but they are also usually inept and they defer too much to 'rules and order' when the other party is not playing by the same rules.
Yep. R are using every dirty trick by treating politics like love and war, and D are treating it like a purity contest. Ultimately, though both are serving, as Gore Vidal put it, the Property party. I want fair and equal accountability, no one to be above the law, and no politician to engage in even the appearance of inappropriate, unethical behavior, or corrupt behavior; and them to get things done that advance the collective good without steamrolling over groups with sudden, huge surprises. But I want more of the good parts of a culture like Japan where people are decent and conscientious and Europe where other people are cared for besides oneself. The US is currently far, far away from anything remotely resembling healthy, long-term sustainable socioeconomic attitudes, policies, and actions.