Handling petulant Senate Republicans

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I do not understand why the threatened Senate Republican filibuster against the seating of Al Franken should be considered a problem by Senate Democrats. My gut reaction is that by using that tactic, John Cornyn and his radical clique would be luring Senate Democrats into using the nuclear option to break the filibuster, about which they would then wail in despair. They'd call it "liberal fascism," and the corporate media would dutifully take up that story line and run for the goals with it. Sounds pretty tiresome, doesn't it?

Harry Reid and Dick Durbin should let Cornyn and McConnell and the others filibuster the seating of Franken as long as they like. While House Democrats assemble an economic stimulus package and get it passed, Republican Senators can read Bible verses on the floor of the Senate without interruption. Democrats, meanwhile, may visit the cable news shows and recommend that all of us who have an interest in preventing an economic depression consider carpet-bombing the Republican National Committee and Senate offices with hostile phone calls and emails demanding an end to the moronic petulant frenzy. Don't you think it would be great TV to see Louisiana Senator David Vitter reading passages from the Old Testament in order to block the seating of Minnesota's newest duly elected Senator? Don't you think it would be a serious tactical blunder, at the very least, for Republicans to filibuster anything while the rest of America "eats cake" waiting for economic governance? I do.

But wait. Now I remember why a Republican filibuster of seating Franken should be considered a problem by Senate Democrats: it's because Democrat leadership is spinless and does not understand that everybody now hates Republicans.