Is it Possible for Democrats to Connive and Fake Like the Reprehensibles?

That's an interesting theory. Let me allow Skippy to tell you more about the so-called 11th hour failed compromise over the Reps' "nuclear option" to end the filibuster:

kos postulates that it was all an incredible bluff:

reid just engaged frist in a game of chicken, and frist blinked first.

reid has been extrememly effective in whipping up opposition to the nuclear option, garnering strong grass- and netroots support, editorial board support, and popular support (as the latest polls show scant appetitite for ending the filibuster).

but in order to avoid looking like obstructionists, demcorats had to make efforts to "find a compromise", lest the chattering class get the vapors from such democratic intransigence.had frist accepted the offers for compromise, bush would've gotten the majority of his judges through, and democrats would've gotten -- who knows what. all published compromise offers didn't seem to give our side anything.

it's hard for us to imagine a democrat that conniving...not that we think democrats shouldn't be conniving, we just don't think any actually are. there hasn't been a clever and devious democrat since lbj hung up his ten gallon and would not run (and if elected, would not serve), which is, ioho, one of the main problems with today's democratic party.

would that reid be the answer to our prayers: someone not afraid to play hardball. and we don't mean the kind of balls used in sports.

I suspected yesterday that the compromise would meet the fate it indeed met. And no, there was nothing to benefit Dems in the compromise. Bush and the Reps have been famous for demanding compromise where they themselves give us nothing...then turn around and shaft the Dems - and worse, the American public - for being stupid enough to believe them.

More importantly than having the Dems behind the Democrats' effort to try to maintain a check-and-balance with the Machiavellian Admin is that most Americans are behind it. They want the filibuster to remain and they think Bush and company are pushing too hard. The blush is fading from the rose, so to speak. And the fade seems to be advancing rapidly.

But - although I'm not prone to conspiracy theories - I'm frankly worried. Whenever Bush gets just so low in popular opinion, something miraculously happens (9/11, the shoe bomber, the Iraq War, terrorist alerts) to help him act like the courageous Dad ::wretch::. I no longer put anything past them because you simply cannot imagine what they're capable of doing. Everytime we've been sure that "even he would not sink that low", he plunges way past low.