Republicans say Obama isn’t being fair?

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”
“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master — that’s all.”
(Through the Looking Glass, Chapter 6)

I noted in the article Spitting In His Hand that Obama’s offer of cooperation with the Republicans has been met with outright obstructionism from the Party of No. Now, the Democrats are thinking about using a legislative maneuver called “reconciliation” to get past the 41% of the Senate that won’t agree to anything. Essentially, this would allow the Senate to pass legislation with 51 votes.

The Republicans are crying foul. They’re now saying it would “wreck bipartisanship.” What bipartisanship? If there was any to be lost, I can see where there might be some concern. And it’s not like this is something that Democrats invented. In 2001, the Republicans in the Senate used ‘reconciliation’ to pass Bush’s tax cuts for the rich, ignoring the Democrats at the time.

On the plus side, Minnesota is just about to send another Democrat to the Senate. Al Franken is clearly ahead and a judicial panel has pretty much doomed Republican Coleman’s chances with a ruling on the last few votes that could possibly make a difference. Coleman and his legal sponsors are dug in like ticks and are dragging out the process as much as they can. (By contrast, remember when Al Gore conceded the 2000 election ‘for the good of the nation’ to allow government to move ahead even though there were lots of legal moves he could have made?) But it’s got to come to an end soon and that will give the Democrats 59 votes of the 60 they need.

Soon, all it will take in any vote is one Republican to cross over.