of catkillers, fundamentalists, and the undead: seems like his nuclear option was more bluster than "shock and awe"...
Seems to me that the biggest take-away is that this is a no-confidence vote for Senator Frist. These seven Republicans undercut his agenda and committed not to follow his lead on the nuclear option. While that deal can be broken at any time, any Senator who signed the document and then votes for the nuclear option is set up for a flip-flop charge at their next election. It puts them on the defensive if they choose to break the deal later.
Reid is simarly undercut but he was not the one who staked his reputation on this issue. In fact, he may even have approved but was unable to enter into the negotiations as leader. Can the minority leader negotiate with anybody on the other side, or is there a tradition that the leadership only deals with the other side's leadership?
Now, on the merits, it's clearly a loss that these three get confirmed. But maybe that was inevitable anyway, and now there's a majority of Senators who have committed not to go nuclear, regardless of the firmness of that commitment. That repudiation leaves Frist weakened, which can only be a good thing.
Given the last head count, it looked like Frist was going to have enough votes to pull the trigger on the nuclear option tomorrow and get all the judges through. This deal bloodied his nose and will keep at least two of the five, maybe three, from getting through.
Was it everything we wanted? No. But we wound up getting a lot more than we would've, and the first round of press spin is marking this round to the Democrats.
Frist is dead in the water for '08, the conservative base is going to howl for a while and turn on its moderates, Dobson has steam coming out of his ears, etc. All in all, the 2006 midterms are going to be great for us.
