... so you don't have to.
Here's the text. Let me edit it down and supply a little commentary:
BASEBALL may be our national pastime... Ben Franklin... David Letterman... Milton Berle...
Man, that first paragraph telegraphs that the man has nothing to say!
Challenges of historic import... Congress ... dysfunction...
Many good people serve in Congress...
I don't want to attack any particular individual, but as a group, you people suck. My father, Birch Bayh...
Everett Dirksen... asked what he could do to help...
A Republican displayed cooperativeness toward a Democrat, back in the old days.
When I was a boy, members of Congress from both parties, along with their families, would routinely visit our home for dinner or the holidays...
The parties partied. Back then. Chez Bayh.
... Sept. 11.... There were no Republicans or Democrats in the room that day...
That golden day...
Let’s start with a simple proposal: why not have a monthly lunch of all 100 senators?
Sounds good, but I'm not
that hungry.
... the current campaign finance system that has such a corrosive effect on Congress....
The recent Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, allowing corporations and unions to spend freely on ads explicitly supporting or opposing political candidates, will worsen matters. The threat of unlimited amounts of negative advertising from special interest groups will only make members more beholden to their natural constituencies and more afraid of violating party orthodoxies.
Help! All that vigorous free speech will make us even bigger pussies than we already are! ... the Senate should reform... the filibuster....
Admittedly, I have participated in filibusters. If not abused, the filibuster can foster consensus-building...
.... filibusters should require 35 senators to sign a public petition and make a commitment to continually debate... Those who obstruct the Senate should pay a price in public notoriety and physical exhaustion....
And, eventually, we will be hungry enough to eat 100 Senators for lunch.
What’s more, the number of votes needed to overcome a filibuster should be reduced to 55 from 60....
During my father’s era, filibusters were commonly used to block civil rights legislation and, in 1975, the requisite number of votes was reduced to 60 from 67. The challenges facing the country today are so substantial that further delay imperils the Republic and warrants another reduction in the supermajority requirement.
The challenge = Scott Brown got elected... and a couple very elderly Dems are not feeling so well. And the majority of Americans don't like what you're trying to do, so you need to get this thing through before the next election. That's like the Civil Rights Act, isn't it?!
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