Sen. Byrd Boasts he Stopped President Clinton From Using Reconciliation

Darn that Al Gore and his internet. Dems sure have said a lot of damning things about reconciliation that miraculously, through the magic of the internet, tend to resurface just in time to bite them on their backsides. This is one of those videos I am sure Democrats are likely to regret. Senator Byrd will likely issue some kind of clarifying statement reminding us they aren't really using reconciliation to pass health care because the bill already passed on Christmas Eve without it.

Meanwhile, Hill Buzz is wondering if we can demand proof of life on the old Byrd yet. Maybe we can get the same folks who analyze Osama's tapes to take a look at Byrd's statements, writings, etc., to prove they are coming from him. Like Osama, we're certain Byrd is still alive. A certain Billy Joel song reminds us why. Still, it would be nice to know if Byrd is reasonably functional these days and lucid enough to cast a vote. One thing is for certain, it is most definitely Senator Byrd bragging in the following video that he single-handedly stopped President Clinton from using reconciliation to pass his health care travesty.




Via Memeorandum

Left Accuses Senator Coburn of Wishing for Death of Senator Byrd

Where else but at the The Huffington Post would you see articles calling for the defeat of the Reid health care bill and a vicious attack against a Republican for doing the very same thing?  As you will see in the video below Coburn's statement was a long way away from a wish for the death of Senator Byrd (D WV).  Coburn's statement is as follows:

What the American people ought to pray is that somebody can't make the vote tonight,"  "That's what they ought to pray."

Never mind the fact that the Dems drag a 92 year old Byrd, who has been in and out of hospitals, out in the snow in the middle of the night so they can ram through an unpopular takeover of our health care system, it's Coburn who is somehow evil for hoping the American people might be spared the travesty because he is praying for a miracle to stop it.  Senator Durbin took to the floor to make a spectacle of Coburn's statement:




As Dana Milbank points out in the Washington Post  Dems were hardly in a position to take the high road after one of their own Senator Whitehouse, "had just delivered an overwrought jeremiad comparing the Republicans to Nazis on Kristallnacht, lynch mobs of the South, and bloodthirsty crowds of the French Revolution."  Milbank was not exaggerating, the bizarre references are clearly there in Whitehouse's statement:

"Too many colleagues are embarked on a desperate, no-holds-barred mission of propaganda, obstruction and fear," he said. "History cautions us of the excesses to which these malignant, vindictive passions can ultimately lead. Tumbrils have rolled through taunting crowds. Broken glass has sparkled in darkened streets. Strange fruit has hung from southern trees." Assuming the role of Old Testament prophet, Whitehouse promised a "day of judgment" and a "day of reckoning" for Republicans.

The day of judgment seems to loom over the head of the Democrats for this debacle yet somehow Whitehouse sees the day of reckoning for Republicans?  It's time they all went home, clearly the fact they have been cooped up in the Senate for 22 days straight has damaged the synapses of the politically suicidal Democrats.   The 22 day stint to ram health care through before Christmas is coming close to breaking the record for the longest straight debate in the Senate.  The current record is 25 days when the Senate met continuously in the early days of World War I.

UPDATE:  Legal Insurrection has video and links to transcripts from Whitehouse's speech.  It's vile.  Milbank  should not have equated the Coburn statement with the insane rantings from Whitehouse, there's no comparison.