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They had a very brief time window when they had a 60-vote super-majority though. Al Franken wasn't seated for months, and then Ted Kennedy died. Scott Brown w
by elihu 2y ago
They had a very brief time window when they had a 60-vote super-majority though. Al Franken wasn't seated for months, and then Ted Kennedy died. Scott Brown won the special election.
Harry Reid opposed filibuster reform at the time, which I think was a mistake but there might not have been enough votes in the Senate to pass any reforms.
Also, the "blue dog" Democrats were a pretty big block in the House, and would have opposed a lot of things that would be considered mainstream Democratic positions now.
- neltnerb 2y agoDo folks not remember the impact of Lieberman on the Affordable Care Act? The person with the 60th vote has a ton of policy influence. This is why we don't have a public option, or at least an awfully public example of how "having 60 votes" during that short window didn't get much done. Not that I want to apologize for the democrats or anything, I just agree that no one has had a meaningful 60-vote majority in my lifetime.
- trealira 2y agoYoung people genuinely may not remember. Being born in 2003, I was 7 years old when the Affordable Care Act was passed, and I wasn't paying much attention to politics. I didn't keep much track until shortly before the 2016 presidential election, although I picked up bits and pieces before then. It's only because I read about politics online that I know about Lieberman's impact on the ACA. Someone else said they were born in 2001; that would have made them 9 years old in 2010. Although, because little kids nowadays have access to smartphones with social media, I suspect that 7 and 9 year olds are now paying more attention to politics than they used to.