Jim Jeffords
Change The Voters, Or Change The Rules?
As I've been saying, the procedural critique of the Senate that some of us have been making for years is starting, but only starting to make headway into the conventional wisdom. The Wall Street Journal's Gerald Seib (who writes a centrist column for the news section) concedes that the filibuster has risen to unprecedented levels, but still sees disappearing comity and centrism as the primary culprit of Senate dysfunction: READ MORE >>
The Jokester
In May 2001, one day after the news broke that Senator Jim Jeffords was leaving the Republican Party, rumors began to spread that Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson was contemplating a move in the opposite direction. The rumors made a certain amount of sense. Nelson was a conservative Democrat and personal friend of President Bush. And Republicans were desperate to reclaim the majority they had just lost. For Nelson, the circumstances were perfect ... to prank-call his press secretary. READ MORE >>
Missing Linc
Twenty-five years before he became the most unlikely star in the U.S. Senate, Lincoln Chafee was a shaggy-haired nomad, fresh from a drug-enhanced stint at Brown University, shoeing horses at harness racetracks in the United States and Canada. His father, Senator John Chafee, may have been a titan of Rhode Island politics, but Linc, as he is known, had little interest in the family business. It wasn't until he grew bored with the private sector--he was working as a manager in a steel mill at the time--that he decided to enter public life. READ MORE >>
