We’re now in the 24th day of the federal government shutdown, making it the second-longest U.S. funding gap in history.
The longest lasted 35 days during President Trump’s first term in office. It occurred due to a budget impasse over the president’s request to fund the construction of a U.S.-Mexico border wall.
This time it's different. The president isn't asking for anything; congressional Republicans aren't requesting anything new.
It's a clean continuing resolution (CR), which only seeks to temporarily fund the government at its current level.
But Senate Democrats, led by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, are holding out to add $1.5 trillion to the budget.
Schumer and other Senate Democrats are under enormous pressure from their far-left party base to keep the government closed until they get what they want, including free healthcare for illegal aliens.
Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania is one of the few Senate Democrats who seems to understand that ending the shutdown is the only right thing to do, and he offered to help Republicans out of the impasse.
On Tuesday Fetterman indicated that he would support a proposal to abolish the Senate filibuster rule in order to pass the CR.
He was concerned that the SNAP program, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, often referred to as food stamps, was about to run out of funds.
"There are no winners here. It's not getting better every day here. People are going to start to get really hungry, and I've been fully, fully committed to fund SNAP, open up the government," Fetterman said.
"This is just bad political theater," he added. "Open it up."
When asked whether he would support "nuking" the Senate filibuster rule that requires 60 votes to end debate, rather than a simple majority, he replied, "Carve it out for that, absolutely."
Democrats "ran on that. We ran on killing the filibuster, and now we love it. Carve it out so we can move on.
"I support it because it makes it more difficult to shut the government down in the future, and that’s where it’s entirely appropriate," he added. "I don’t want to hear any Democrat clutching their pearls about the filibuster. We all ran on it."
If we were watching a movie, this would be the moment where someone rushes into the room, waving his hands, shouting, "Stop! Don’t fall for it! It’s a trap!"
Although Fetterman more-than-likely had the best of intentions with his suggestion, it would indeed be a trap.
It would change the manner in which the Senate does business.
Democrats always want to axe the filibuster every time they hold the majority in the Senate. That way they could ram through whatever cockamamie proposal they want with a simple majority vote.
If that were to happen during a Democratic Senate majority, we could expect Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, unrealistic motor vehicle emission standards, and packing the Supreme Court with like-minded liberals.
The 60-vote filibuster rule was designed to allow for democratic rule, but tempered with minority rights to prevent mob rule.
It's one reason that the Senate is called the deliberative body of Congress, where its members engage in prolonged debate.
"So extended debate is literally the heart and it's the most defining feature of the way the Senate does its work in the legislative process and has been for more than 200 years," Heritage Foundation senior legal fellow Tom Jipping explained.
Even the manner in which the Senate is comprised promotes minority rights.
Wyoming, for example, has the same number of senators as does California — two — despite the fact that California has 52 U.S. House seats, while Wyoming has but one.
Each House member represents and promotes the interests of the people within his particular district, whereas each senator represents and promotes the interests of his entire state.
Meanwhile Schumer is feeling heat because although ending the shutdown with a clean CR is the right thing to do, his far-left base demands he keep it closed.
At this point Schumer may want to ask any Senate Democrats who aren't up for reelection until 2030 to switch their vote and open the government.
But one thing they absolutely, positively cannot do, under any circumstance, is to kill the filibuster.
Don't fall for it. It's a trap.
Michael Dorstewitz is a retired lawyer and is a frequent contributor to Newsmax. He's also a former U.S. Merchant Marine officer and a Second Amendment supporter. Read Michael Dorstewitz's Reports — More Here.
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