Even after this week’s agreement between Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. Senate on President Bush’s judicial nominations to the federal courts, the issue of the filibuster is not likely to go away. As a result, I thought it was important to include opposing commentary on the issue by two figures who happen to be Minnesotans, former Republican U.S. Senator Rudy Boschwitz and scholar Norman Ornstein. Both have published articles on the subject in the Star Tribune recently.

Boschwitz’s opinion piece is a rejoinder to an earlier Star Tribune essay by his fellow former Minnesota senators Walter Mondale and Dave Durenberger (discussed in this column on May 6), who criticized Republican efforts to end the filibuster.

Unlike the latter two ex-senators, Boschwitz supports the current Republican efforts to end the filibuster for judicial nominees. He writes that the Democrats broke “a centuries-long Senate tradition against filibusters of judicial nominees” when they filibustered 10 Bush judicial nominations during the last Congress. He says such judicial filibusters “assert precedent-shattering power over the confirmation process and erode constitutional checks and balances.” The filibuster, he claims, is “a tactic historically used only against legislation.” He claims that the 1968 filibuster of Abe Fortas was done under “extraordinary circumstances that are not comparable to the current situation,” though he does not elaborate on why that is so.

Boschwitz also writes, “The Constitution clearly specifies the few instances where more than a majority vote is required for Senate approval,” and he mentions the two-thirds majority needed to ratify a treaty or override a presidential veto.

Norman Ornstein, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, rebuts several major Republican claims on filibusters of judicial nominations in a May 18 article published in Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper. First, he criticizes the notion that there is a tradition of not filibustering judicial nominations. He says that there is no way to deny that the filibuster against Fortas was a historical precedent; it was a true filibuster.

Second, he attacks the notion that there is a tradition of giving judicial nominees an up-or-down vote on the floor of the Senate. “I have searched through a whole lot of history of the Senate,” he writes, “from George Haynes’ classic volumes to memoirs and other literature. I have yet to read anything about some long-standing tradition, custom or unwritten rule against filibustering judicial nominees.”

Third, he rejects the idea that there is “a two-century-plus tradition of giving presidents up-or-down votes on their judicial nominations.” He writes that hundreds of judicial nominations have been killed in committee. Though they weren’t filibustered, they were often killed by a single senator under a tradition that gave a home-state senator veto power over nominees. Ornstein notes that this latter tradition was ended during the Clinton administration by Orrin Hatch when he was Judiciary Committee chairman.

Ornstein does not address the issue of whether the nominees who failed to reach floor votes had majority support or not, but the clear implication is that many of them would likely have had majority support. Thus, the Senate’s advice and consent to the president has involved rejection of nominees without a floor vote. Why did these rejected nominations not involve a filibuster? “Because it was easy enough to kill most of the controversial ones without resorting to a filibuster,” Ornstein writes.

Ornstein closes his Roll Call essay with harsh criticism of Republican actions on judicial nominations during the Clinton years:

“There is no record I can find of a historical period in which the Senate systematically killed such nominations. Rather, they tended to be done on a case-by-case basis. But that did change in the second Clinton term, when dozens of judicial nominees, including many to appeals courts, were denied hearings, in some cases for four or five years, not on the basis of any charge that they were ideologically extreme or unqualified, but rather because they represented slots on important courts, worth keeping open in case the next president turned out to be a Republican.

“If we want to look for a breach in Senate traditions, that is where to start. And the failure to bring more than 60 to the floor for up-or-down votes makes one gape at Frist’s astonishing comment that the standard in the Clinton years was 51 votes. For these 60 would-be judges, it was a one-vote standard–that of the chairman of the Judiciary Committee.

“There are longstanding traditions in the Senate regarding judicial nominations. Those traditions call for a vigorous and independent Senate playing its role of advice and consent. They understand that judicial nominations, because they represent lifetime appointments which cannot and should not be easily rescinded, require higher hurdles than simple legislation which can always be amended or repealed.”

In another article printed in the Star Tribune May 22nd, Ornstein further criticized Republicans for their proposed method of changing Senate rules to end judicial filibusters. Such a change would allow a simple majority to change the Senate’s rules and create a new precedent: “Namely, that whatever the Senate rules say–regardless of the view held since the Senate’s beginnings that it is a continuing body with continuing rules and precedents–they can be ignored or reversed at any given moment on the whim of the current majority.”

If Ornstein is correct, and he certainly appears to be, then it is disturbing that little of this historically accurate information is a part of our current debate on judicial nominations.

Last week I wrote about my disappointment with Twin Cities commercial radio in my youth. Although I learned about much new music on local radio during my teenage years in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, there was still more new music that never got any airtime. Years later, when I realized what I’d missed, I saw that my feelings were captured well by Elvis Costello in his 1978 song “Radio, Radio”: “The radio is in the hands of such a lot of fools / tryin’ to anaesthetize the way that you feel.” Of course, I had to wait years to hear that song too.

The new generation should have less trouble exploring a wider range of music via the radio. That’s because 89.3 The Current (KCMP), a new station owned by Minnesota Public Radio, has been operating since January 24 of this year.

Locals will likely know that The Current replaces classical music station WCAL, owned by St. Olaf College. The college sold it to MPR, which changed the format to an eclectic mix of music. The sale angered many devoted WCAL listeners and created some controversy.

I was more sanguine about the station’s change. I figured I’d like the new format, and I could still listen to classical music on MPR’s classical station, KSJN. It turns out, though, that reception of KSJN isn’t all that clear here in my town of Northfield, hometown of the former WCAL and The Current.

It’s a good thing, therefore, that I’ve been impressed by The Current. The music is amazingly varied, mixing lots of brand new stuff with vintage music that most commercial stations wouldn’t play. I’ve heard Hank Williams, Chet Baker, and Johnny Cash alongside Beck and the Chemical Brothers. The focus is more on new music, and they play lots of stuff from performers I’ve never heard of, like the Mountain Goats, which is fine by me. They’re also good about playing lots of local music.

The Current reminds me of WXPN, another non-profit, “listener-supported” radio station. WXPN broadcasts out of Philadelphia, and I used to listen to it when I lived in New Jersey. WXPN introduced me to the music of Richard Thompson, Beth Orton, Richard Ashcroft, and many others, and it allowed me to keep up with bands such as The Jayhawks. I expect The Current will bring me more of the same.

Apparently the station is doing pretty well. The Arbitron ratings of listeners age 18 to 34 show The Current ranked 11th in the Twin Cities, higher than its closest competitor in the “adult album alternative” format, Drive 105. Remember, though, that there really isn’t a format for The Current. And don’t forget, there are no commercials.

Today is Syttende Mai (Seventeenth of May), Norway’s Constitution Day. We were fortunate enough to celebrate the day at a “Syttende mai frokost” (breakfast) at St. Olaf College, an institution founded by Norwegian Americans. The food on hand included herring, salmon, goat cheese, and Norwegian waffles with lingonberry jam and sour cream.

As our family went to sit down, St. Olaf College president Chris Thomforde motioned for us to join him at his table. In my few meetings with him I’ve always found him to be an especially friendly person. He entertained us with some stories of his basketball-playing years, including his unsuccessful tryout with the New York Knicks. He eventually went on to graduate school at Yale and became a Lutheran minister.

The breakfast was sponsored by the St. Olaf Norwegian Department and the Norwegian House. It featured a short program of Hardanger fiddle music, a type of Norwegian folk music. The fiddle players wore traditional Norwegian costume and played on ornately decorated fiddles.

A handout at the program included some information about the holiday:

“The 17th of May celebrates the signing of the Norwegian constitution on May 17, 1814, at the end of the 400-year union with Denmark. Shortly afterward, Norway was forced into a union with Sweden that lasted from 1814 to 1905, when Norway finally won its independence.

“This year, Norway is observing the Centennial Anniversary of the peaceful dissolution of its union with Sweden, and there are many special events planned in Norway as well as in many other countries, including the United States. This summer, St. Olaf is planning to send its largest contingent ever to Norway for the Centennial Anniversary. In June, 260 musicians, 20 faculty and staff, and nearly 100 travelers in three different Study Travel programs will represent the college as they enjoy Norway’s festivities, scenery, and people.”

As part of the program, we sang the Norwegian anthem, “Ja, Vi Elsker,” and a patriotic tune called “Norge i rodt, hvitt og blatt” (”Norway in red, white and blue”). The latter celebrates the national colors, which the population was forbidden to wear during the Nazi occupation of Norway in the Second World War. Here are the lyrics in English:

Norway in Red, White and Blue

Wherever you go in the meadow and mountain,
a winter day, a summer evening
by the fjord and waterfall,
from the meadows and pine barrens,
from the ocean’s edge with fishing villages
and to the white reefs,
you meet the land in a tricolor dress,
cradled in the reflection of the colors of the flag.
See the white-stemmed birch on the hillside,
framing the patch of bluebells
against the red-painted cabin by the road;
it’s the flag that waves in the wind.
Yes, the snow is as white as the white of the flag,
and the evening sun has taken on the red color,
and to the glaciers the blue lends its color,
it is Norway in red, white and blue.

My teenage years were deprived in an important way. While those living in many other places at that time–the late 1970’s and early 1980’s–heard a wide range of exciting new music on the radio, I was listening to the repetitive playlists of Twin Cities stations such as KQ92 (classic rock) and KDWB (top 40). So, while others elsewhere were learning about punk, obscure New Wave, early rap, and more, I listened mostly to older bands such as Led Zeppelin, Boston, the Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, and George Thorogood and the Destroyers, all for the umpteenth time. On the pop stations you had Hall and Oates, Whitney Houston, Prince, and, ahh, I forget the others.

As good as much of that music was, I got tired of hearing “Stairway to Heaven” for the thirtieth time. I knew the radio situation wasn’t good, but I didn’t go out of my way to find other ways to hear new music. Some people around me, however, were doing exactly that during my high school years. A guy named Todd Enge brought rap music into the locker room, probably around 1980. At the time, I thought he was rather nuts to like such strange stuff. Jeff Richter and his buddies were listening to Elvis Costello’s “Punch the Clock.” The really cool guys, like Ed O’Gara, were going to concerts and had discovered the B-52’s, the Replacements, Black Flag, and the Dead Kennedys. (I’ve still not explored the latter two). And my good friend Tom Harkins had delved deeply into David Bowie and the Talking Heads.

I don’t want to overstate my case here. There was some new music to hear on the radio. Once my brain had assimilated the playlists of KQ and KDWB, I was drawn to interruptions in the formats. And so, like many others, I was excited to hear U2, Blondie, the Go-go’s, Devo, Human League, the Police, the Thompson Twins, the Violent Femmes, Gary Neuman, Icehouse, A Flock of Seagulls, Berlin, the Motels, Depeche Mode, the Pretenders, Men Without Hats, and more. There was even some local music (besides Prince) that made it through my media filter: bands called the Phones and the Wallets, and especially the Suburbs, who hailed from my neck of the woods.

But there was only so much variety on these very commercial stations. The masses still had to be counted on for dough, they had to be given their repetitive playlists, and people like myself, who disliked the repetition but didn’t go to concerts and obscure record stores and trade lots of music with friends to escape it, just had to make do.

When I showed up for my freshman year at the University of Chicago in the fall of 1984, I learned of still more music that had not reached my particular province. Andrew Halpern, from Holyoke, Mass., had some great Smiths music. I can still hear that group’s mysterious rhythms and haunting lyrics in the dorm hallway: “I am human and I need to be loved, just like everybody else does.” A guy named Ramon had an album titled “Murmur” from a band called REM; he had a cool REM t-shirt too (with a bicycle on it, if I remember right). Someone from DC told me that Husker Du, a Minneapolis band, was really good. Scott Durschlag, a young radical, liked to play Elvis Costello’s version of “What’s so funny ’bout peace, love, and understanding?” With the exception of Husker Du, of which I remain largely ignorant, all of those artists became an important part of my later youth.

I had heard none of that music at home. Looking back on it, it seems a damn shame that I didn’t have access to a more adventurous radio station. However, it’s also a damn shame that I didn’t go to some concerts and learn some more. I stayed close to my commercial media island, even while I suspected that exciting stuff existed far from the familiar shores of my surroundings.

Of course many people grow up in places much more musically isolated than the Twin Cities suburbs were in my youth. How well I remember traveling across the country on family trips and hearing rural radio stations that were years behind the times. The Internet and cable/satellite media are reducing much of that kind of regional isolation for kids who yearn to escape their own versions of commercial radio hell. However, it will always take some gumption and effort to reach beyond the deadening repetitiveness of the commercial airwaves.

Next week: 89.3 The Current brings a breath of fresh air to Twin Cities radio.

In the first version of my May 13 post, I claimed that David Durenberger had endorsed John Kerry for president last fall. I did some further research and discovered my error. Durenberger endorsed Kerry’s health care plan, not his candidacy, though it could be argued that it was an implicit endorsement of Kerry. The post has been corrected.

A couple of Star Tribune articles recently caught my attention.

Buried in the Metro section of May 3, the first article concerned a family from Eden Prairie, Minnesota. Phil and Randi Reitan, along with their son Jacob, who is gay, were arrested in Colorado Springs, Colorado, for trespassing on the grounds of Focus on the Family, a conservative Christian organization that opposes homosexuality. The family carried a letter that they wanted to deliver to the organization’s leader, Dr. James Dobson. Approximately 150 supporters of the Reitans watched as they were arrested on May 2.

The Reitans belong to a group known as Soulforce, a national faith-based group that protests the propagation of anti-gay messages in churches. Several hundred Soulforce members participated in a rally held just outside the Focus on the Family campus on Sunday, May 1.

The article has this quote from Phil Reitan about his attempt to deliver the letter: “I said, ‘I’m an attorney. I’m a Christian. I’m a father who loves my family more than anything. This is important because every day Dr. Dobson assaults my family. We need to get this message to him so we’re going to deliver [the letter].’ ”

“We wanted to say focus on our family for one day, Dr. Dobson,” said Jacob Reitan. “See how we did it. We aren’t just here to deliver a letter, we’re here to deliver ourselves to him.”

Soulforce founder Mel White said the Reitan’s act was part of their effort to bring national attention to the issue. “When the Reitans walked into that mass of cameras and said, ‘We love our gay son,’ whoever hears that will be moved,” White said. “That’s a message to the nation that’s never been seen. It wasn’t for Dobson. We’re using Dobson to send a message to the nation.”

I recommend reading the letter that the Reitan’s attempted to deliver. For more information, see Soulforce’s press release about the protest, Focus on the Family’s article on the same, and articles in the Colorado Springs Gazette.

On the U.S. Senate Filibuster

The second article that caught my attention was an op-ed piece. Former U.S. senators from Minnesota, Walter Mondale and David Durenberger, recently co-wrote a Star Tribune op-ed piece against the proposed rule changes in the U.S. Senate that would end the minority party’s right to filibuster judicial nominees.

The two make a persuasive case that ending the filibuster would, in their words, “profoundly and permanently undermine the purpose of the U.S. Senate as it has stood since Thomas Jefferson first wrote the Senate’s rules.” They argue that these rules–which now allow any senator to speak for an unlimited period of time unless there is a 60-vote majority in favor of ending debate–create a more deliberative body than the U.S. House. And that deliberation produces better courts, they argue. “This Senate rule has led to a stronger, less partisan, truly independent court,” they write. Ending the filibuster, they argue, will mean that “[t]he courts will be seen less as independent tribunals that transcend politics and instead will become, increasingly, agents of political passions.”

The op-ed piece represents a bipartisan effort, since Mondale is a Democrat and Durenberger is a Republican. As a moderate Republican, Durenberger finds himself increasingly on the margin of his party. Last fall he endorsed Sen. John Kerry’s health care plan as superior to that of President Bush.

Among others, conservative columnist George Will has argued against ending the filibuster for approval of judicial nominees. He argued instead that Republicans should focus on gaining a 60-seat majority in the Senate.

For another view of the recent history of the filibuster as it relates to judicial nominees, see an analysis by David Espo of the Associated Press.

It’s been a cold week or two here. The chilly weather has given us nighttime temperatures down around freezing. As April turned into May, snowflakes flew through the air, though none stayed on the ground. We awoke to a dusting of snow on our rooftops on Monday, May 2nd.

The crops are two weeks behind, according to Minnesota Public Radio this morning, and the plants in our garden have been growing in slow motion. Fortunately, they seem no worse for the near-freezing temperatures.

One of our tulips is finally about to open, and I hope that a warmer season will burst out with it.