The Senate

Ok. It’s been a long week. Let’s have some fun:

Americans can be proud to live in a nation so well served by its elected bodies. In particular the Senate deserves praise for its resolute avoidance of anything resembling action. The nation has few opportunities to come together and make a collective statement, indeed it happens only every four years with the election of the president. To the extent that such an election is an expression of a desire on the part of the people it is heartwarming to see the message so clearly and persuasively ignored in the chambers of the Senate. We can rely on that august body to turn back any semblance of democracy, and to remind us all of the republican and aristocratic roots of our system of government. Not for nothing did our founders ensure that the Senate would be a bastion of anti-democratic procedure.

That the founding fathers deserve the plaudits and honors we so frequently bestow upon them is derived from their keen foresight and trenchant desire to stop incipient democratic tendencies in their soil ridden tracks. No other institution that the founders handed down to us can be so keen a representation of their deep insight that democracy is a very bad thing. The shallow thoughts of the unwashed working men, and even women – the very though would be anathema to the founders of course – are hardly sufficient cause to press the nation in any direction other than towards chaos. A great nation such as the United States of America cannot be held hostage to the whimsical and ill thought through predilections of its people. The very thought of the majority riding roughshod over the minority sends shudders down the spine of every self respecting land owner – a deserving minority if ever there was one.

So as a bulwark against the tide of popular demand the founders bequeathed us the Senate, and expect us to recognize the essential nature of that gift every time we read of its determined inaction.

Not content with ensuring the over-representation of the small states, the founders made sure that equal representation of each voter was never an option: they stripped the voters of the larger states of that equality by giving each state the same number of senators. The Senate’s defiance of democratic thinking is inherent in its very composition.

That today’s sturdy descendants of those original anti-democratic founders are worthy of their heritage is amply demonstrated by their loyalty to non-constitutional rules that amplify the chambers inherent anti-democratic bias. The Senate has, through the years, developed its own rules to ensure it never gets swept up by the immature emotions it detects amongst the inadequately educated and impressionable voting plebes who clutter the voting booths nowadays. It, in a supreme act of humility and bravery, has adopted a rule that prevents a majority of senators from acting as if they were a majority. This extraordinary act of self denial is a a timeless testimony to the anti-democratic commitment of the Senate as it acts as a great and vital bulwark against the tyranny of the masses.

As we reflect on the Senate’s glorious inaction several key individuals stand out for their brilliance, charm, knowledge of procedures, and their contempt for the people. I will laud but two:

So let us give praise for the Independent senator from Connecticut who almost daily stood in brave defiance of the nation, his colleagues, and the ignorami of his own state. Such complete disregard for progress and change is a very rare and fine quality even in by the Senate’s high standards for those same qualities. His ability to twist and turn against the gusts of popular demand, his uncanny skill of non-committal commitment to nothing or something both at the same time and not at all is now a legend.

Let us also recognize the lady Senator from Maine, who established new records for her ability to string out negotiations over points so fine and detailed that even her fellow Senators were unaware of their existence – and remember these are people whose regard for the inconsequential sentence or clause on an obscure back page footnote is the very essence of detailed debating skill. Such was the good Senator from Maine’s ability that she became the fulcrum upon which the entire Senate depended for its inactivity. Had she fallen at any point, even for an instant, the Senate’s long and proud tradition of discussing to no effect might well have been destroyed. But no! She held firm. The public and the mortals of the media were treated to her presence and her words. We learned inordinate details about the way she wore her hair. We watched her wardrobe move through its seasonal changes, no doubt reflecting the wonders of the weather Down East. But not once, not ever, did we learn what she actually thought. Such obfuscation is wondrous to behold. We are well served by such public overlords and ladies.

So, as the nation anxiously turns to discuss its budget crisis and the looming deficits that some – the uneducated – might argue need urgent attention, it can rest assured that with men and women such as these two fine Senators filling its ranks that nowhere will anything happen. No legislation will pass through those doors. No decisions will be made. There will be no foolish bending to the public breeze. Nor any cowardly capitulation to the forces of the masses.

The thin somnolent line will hold firm.

The debate will be fine. The rhetoric will soar. Votes will be taken. But the line will hold.

Rest assured America your Senate will not let you down! Nothing will happen to disrupt the long and proud tradition the Senate knows you cherish so much.

Action must, and will, be avoided.