Quote (Pollster @ Oct 21 2014 02:45pm)
Don't bother wasting my time with your sad attempts at projection. They never work. As usual, the only person who is lying, "spinning" anything, and (of course) repeating the same statements over and over in a failed hope that that alone will make them true is yourself.
And yes, they did. You can keep claiming that there's a difference between the several instances listed and the one you're upset about but there isn't one. The creation of the cloture vote (1917), the amending of the cloture threshold from membership to voting and the expansion to further amend (1959), the reduction of the supermajority threshold to 3/5ths (1975), and the removal of post-cloture delay (1979) were all accomplished in the same exact manner procedurally as the 2013 change. The 2013 change was merely the latest instance in an amending process that the Senate had undergone several times prior. It's possible that you simply aren't informed of Senate history, or that you merely don't understand how the body actually works (the likelier of the two, given your demonstration that you don't know what "cloture" is or how it works), but repeating the same baseless claim over and over again gets you nowhere. 200 years of well-documented history isn't going to magically disappear.
Yes, Senate Republicans did withhold unanimous consent more after the rule change in 2013, but they were already regularly withholding it to a historic degree for 6 years prior to that change. That can't rationally be denied at this point, and their behavior since going into the minority can't be explained away just by inaccurately and deceptively characterizing a rule change that occurred years later. You're free to pretend that the behavior that began in 2007 magically just didn't occur until 2013, but even casual Senate observers are going to laugh at that because it's obviously not true.
I'm not projecting, you are.
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/The+constitutional+option+to+change+Senate+rules+and+procedures%3a+a...-a0129013610Quote
Byrd made clear that if his rules-change proposal were filibustered, he would invoke the Senate's powers under the U.S. Constitution to force a vote. (5) Byrd never carried out his threat to use the "constitutional option." He never had to. His threat to use it was enough to break the opposition and secure a vote on his rules-change proposal. (6)
Byrd has not been alone, either in his views or his tactics. The constitutional option has been endorsed, explicitly or implicitly, by three U.S. Vice Presidents and three times, by the Senate itself. Moreover, on three occasions prior to 1979, a majority had used the threat of the constitutional option to force a formal change to the Senate Standing Rules.
Senator Thomas J. Walsh (D-MT) first advocated using the constitutional option in 1917. (7) Like Byrd, Walsh reasoned that a newly commenced Senate may disregard the rules established by a prior Senate, including the rules governing filibusters, and adopt new rules in their stead. (8) During this process, Walsh explained, the Senate would revert to the powers set forth in the U.S. Constitution and rely upon traditional parliamentary procedures, which contain procedural mechanisms to control filibusters. (9) Like Byrd's opponents, Walsh's opponents gave way once they realized that Walsh potentially had enough votes to carry out his plan, resulting in the Senate adopting its first formal role limiting debate. (10)
Similarly, in 1959, after over a dozen civil rights bills had been defeated by filibusters, and in 1975, after nearly two decades of rules-change attempts were thwarted, the minority gave way and agreed to amend the Senate cloture rule once it became apparent that a majority of the Senate was prepared to carry out the constitutional option. On all four occasions--1917, 1959, 1975, and 1979--the rules changes may never have been adopted but for the prospect that the constitutional option would be exercised.
Stop fucking lying. Also, the Senate has never, until 2013, limited the contents of the debate like Reid did.
I personally don't give a rat's ass about the years prior to nuclear Harry. That's your own world of butthurt.