Are we being sold out by politicians?

Source,

You might have heard that Sen­ate Repub­li­cans “saved” the fil­i­buster yes­ter­day.

But thanks to a report­ed back­room deal between John McCain and Har­ry Reid, the fil­i­buster wound up effec­tive­ly being a dead let­ter against the nom­i­na­tions in ques­tion.

As I’ve told you, Har­ry Reid was threat­en­ing to gut the fil­i­buster — and was even threat­en­ing to break the Sen­ate rules to do it.

But Reid did­n’t even have to fol­low through on this threat to get every­thing he want­ed and then some.

Reid is now pre­tend­ing he gave some­thing up by with­draw­ing two of Barack Oba­ma’s nom­i­nees to the Nation­al Labor Rela­tions Board — Oba­ma’s two bogus “recess” appointees who have con­tin­ued to issue deci­sions even after a fed­er­al court ruled their appoint­ments were uncon­sti­tu­tion­al.

But it is a Pyrrhic vic­to­ry at best.

You see, John McCain promised Har­ry Reid that Sen­ate Repub­li­cans would agree to ANY new NLRB nom­i­nees, no ques­tions asked.

Not only that, as part of the “deal” Repub­li­cans promised to expe­dite the con­fir­ma­tion process.

And just hours after McCain and Reid cut the deal behind closed doors, Barack Oba­ma had his own secret meet­ing with top AFL-CIO union boss Richard Trum­ka.

Oba­ma has already announced Big Labor’s new hand-picked nom­i­nees, both career union lawyers.

The fact is, Har­ry Reid is fac­ing no price for his out­ra­geous threat to break the Sen­ate rules and gut the fil­i­buster.

And because John McCain put togeth­er a pre­emp­tive sur­ren­der on the new nom­i­nees, Har­ry Reid, Barack Oba­ma, and Richard Trum­ka are going to get exact­ly what they want: A biased Nation­al Labor Rela­tions Board that will con­tin­ue to run roughshod over work­er free­dom.

What John McCain is ignor­ing is that the fil­i­buster isn’t just about the rights of the minor­i­ty par­ty in the Sen­ate.

It’s about you, the Amer­i­can peo­ple.

So the ques­tion is not whether or not the union boss­es and Har­ry Reid, with the help of Sen­a­tor McCain, won — they did.

The ques­tion going for­ward is whether you and I on future exec­u­tive branch and judi­cial nom­i­na­tions can inject some back­bone into the Sen­ate Repub­li­can Minor­i­ty.

It’s an open ques­tion, but it’s clear we must try.

Thanks again for all you do.