Posted on 01/26/2006 6:57:08 PM PST by metalmanx2j
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Senate's top Republican decided Thursday to force a showdown on Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito early next week, with the two Democratic senators from Massachusetts pushing to block a vote.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist filed a motion to cut off debate on the Alito nomination after his Democratic counterpart, Minority Leader Harry Reid, objected to a move by GOP leaders to schedule a final vote on his confirmation Monday afternoon.
Frist's motion, which requires 60 votes under Senate rules, will come up for a vote at 4:30 p.m. Monday. If successful, senators will then vote on Alito's nomination at 11 a.m. Tuesday, with a simple majority of 51 votes needed for approval.
Frist's move came as Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts was lobbying his Democratic colleagues to filibuster the Alito nomination -- an uphill fight, given that none of the chamber's 55 Republicans have opposed his confirmation and three Democrats are on the record supporting it.
"Judge Alito's confirmation would be an ideological coup on the Supreme Court," Kerry said in a written statement.
"We can't afford to see the court's swing vote, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, replaced with a far-right ideologue like Samuel Alito."
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
then maybe you shouldnt have been such a dufus last year, you moron.
Is Kerry ever going to get tired of losing?
Frist should have cut off debate today, scheduled a cloture vote for tonight, and a vote for confirmation tomorrow at 10:00 AM. But, no, the weak sister gives the traitor/treason Democrats until next week. What a whimp!!!
I like it, that's the warrior's way.
A born loser thrives on losing. Kerry is living proof.
He, or rather his filibuster, should be nuked.
"Early Next Week" ? What happened to a vote on Friday ?
You got that right! The only thing that makes me almost as furious as the DimWit traitors, are the Repub cowards & wimps who let them get away with it....again & again & again & so on. Frist is either a wimpy coward a complete ineffectual buffoon of a leader...or both!
You don't know much about Senate rules, obviously. Once the cloture motion is filed, they have to wait a full day before it can be voted upon. The earliest that could happen would have been Saturday. If cloture is successful there is supposed to be 30 hours of additional debate, so Reid must have agreed to wiave the addditional hours for them to schedule the vote for confirmation vote for Tuesday.
Big mistake IMHO... they will manage a coupe' by Monday, I feel it in my bones.
Yes there is a time limit between the filing of a cloture petition and the actual cloture vote.
The procedure for "invoking cloture," or ending a filibuster, is as follows:
* A minimum of sixteen senators must sign a petition for cloture.
* The petition for cloture may be presented by interrupting another Senator's speech.
* The Senate's clerk reads the petition.
* The cloture petition is ignored for one full day during which the Senate is sitting (If the petition is filed on a Friday, it is ignored until Tuesday, assuming that the Senate did not sit on Saturday or Sunday.)
* On the second calendar day during which the Senate sits after the presentation of the petition, after the Senate has been sitting for one hour, a "quorum call" is undertaken to ensure that a majority of the Senators are present.
* The President or President pro tempore presents the petition.
* The Senate votes on the petition; three-fifths of the whole number of Senators (sixty with no vacancies) is the required majority; however, when cloture is invoked on a question of changing the rules of the Senate, two-thirds of the Senators voting (not necessarily two-thirds of all Senators) is the requisite majority.
After cloture has been invoked, the following restrictions apply:
* No more than thirty hours of debate may occur.
* No Senator may speak for more than one hour.
* No amendments may be moved unless they were filed on the day in between the presentation of the petition and the actual cloture vote.
* All amendments must be relevant to the debate.
* Certain debates on procedure are not permissible.
* The presiding officer gains additional power in controlling debate.
* No other matters may be considered until the question upon which cloture was invoked is disposed of.
What are they gonna do? Cry? Frist is rather weak but was confident enough to file cloture so he must know that he has the votes.
Memo to SNOB Kerry
What makes you think you're so great?
You didn't attend the debate.
Yet you'll boss around others
(Senate sisters and brothers)
You tell them their vote has to wait.
That only would have antagonized more moderate Dems.
Is this what a once great party has come to, wasting time?
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