The U.S. Senate is broken. With everything requiring 60 votes to begin and end debate, (without actual fillibusters happening mind you, just the threat of them) and with individual members able to place holds (secret or not) on nominees and legislation for any reason, it’s no wonder that nothing is getting done. The Senate, essentially, is where good legislation goes to die. That kind of obstruction was a big part of the reason why we drafted Halter to take on Senator Lincoln, besides her just being a crappy Senator. There is a big push to get some reform of the Senate rules come 2011, but there are still a lot of people standing in the way. Surprise surprise, one of them is our other crappy Senator, Mark Pryor.

Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) said he recognizes his colleagues are frustrated over the failure to pass measures such as the Disclose Act, campaign legislation that fell three votes short of overcoming a Republican filibuster Tuesday.

“I think as torturous as this place can be, the cloture rule and the filibuster is important to protect the rights of the minority,” he said. “My inclination is no.”

As precious as the rights of the minority party are (and yeah, when we were in the minority we fought to protect the fillibuster) Republicans and a few bad Democrats have taken the country hostage when we’re in the worst economy since the thirties. I know the Senate is supposed to operate on tradition and congeniality and all that bullshit like the country club it is, but frankly the country can’t afford that kind of patrician nonsense. It’s time to get rid of holds, and while we might not want to get rid of the fillibuster entirely, they should at least make them stand and read from the phone book rather than just threaten to do so.

As usual, Pryor has showed himself to be absolutely useless, even more so than our senior senator, who has at least committed to getting rid of secret holds. He’s an agent of conservative obstruction, plain and simple.

Ever wonder why our state Democratic party sucks?  It’s simple.  The same tired old people with the same tired old ideas keep running the show.  It’s a good ol’ boys club in every sense of the term-a back slapping, go with the flow, don’t rock the boat club.  And with the state party structure being what it is, it starts at the lowest level and spreads up like a constricting vine.

Other county parties stand up to keep their elected officials in line.  Other county parties show their support for good public policy and push those in the party to do the same.  But not our local party aparatus.  They sit on their hands and just watch things happen.  Long time reader James has kept me informed of the complacency and dysfunction of his local party (something I’d encourage him to share with the full community in a user diary) and their failures to take advantage of opportunities or to even inform people when meetings were and who they needed to talk to in the party!  How messed up is that!?  Making things worse is that most of the people in the state party machinery have no idea how to put modern innovations to work, including blogs, twitter, actblue, facebook, or youtube.

So how do we change all this?  Good question.  It’s going to take a lot of work and a lot of people getting involved with the local parties and exhibiting real progressive leadership to shape the Arkansas Democratic party up, but it’s worth it.  Imagine if Blanche Lincoln and Mike Ross had been confronted by county parties last year passing resolutions in support of a public option.  Imagine if we had a Democratic party that new how to work in the twenty-first century and was active around the clock registering voters, building a voter file, and getting out the vote instead of sitting on its hands.  It’s all possible, but only if we activists become involved at the local level and start taking over the county committees.  This is an idea that’s going to take time to flesh out into a major campaign, but if you’re interested or know someone who is, here are the ADP’s party rules.  Let’s put them to good use and work to get progressive activists in place on the committees to take over the state party.