One more defection to the Dark Side

Yesterday I heard Michael Kinsley on the Al Franken show. He talked about the Nuclear Option and sounded like he was channeling Bill Frist. He repeats the same nonsense in the LA Times today.

We usually like it when centrist senators like John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) try to galvanize the sensible center on behalf of some compromise, but we sincerely hope they fail in their attempt to preserve the Senate's filibuster. Count this page on the side of conservative social activists who are pushing Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist to "nuke" the filibuster.

We don't share these activists' enthusiasm for the White House judicial nominees triggering the current showdown. But we do believe that nominees are entitled to a vote on the floor of the Senate. The filibuster, an arcane if venerable parliamentary tactic that empowers a minority of 41 senators to block a vote, goes above and beyond those checks on majority power legitimately written into the Constitution.

An arcane parliamentary tactic that "goes above and beyond those checks on majority power legitimately written into the Constitution"? So I guess the minority deserves no protection from a majority run wild. In this case it's a majority of Senators who represent a minority of the citizens of the United States and a President with an approval rating in the low 40's

.......Frist is now threatening to force a change in rules to prohibit filibusters of judicial nominees. That would be a great triumph for the American people. It would be an even greater triumph if the Senate were to destroy the filibuster altogether.

This is a statement that the likes of William Safire would have been proud to have said. Combined with Kinsley's apparent support for dismantling Social Security he leaves little doubt he has gone over to the dark side.