The Coalition's Victory, As Told By...David Corn???!!!

I would be hard pressed, if given an entire weekend, to come up with even three areas of agreement that I have ever shared with David Corn, the Washington editor of far-left rag The Nation, but lo-and-behold, he has just (disapprovingly, of course) laid out perhaps the best justification for the Coalition of the Chillin' I have yet seen. Once in a while you can get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right:

Let's be clear about this. During the nuclear option fight, the Democrats were not able to court enough Republicans to prevent Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist from killing the judicial filibuster in an up-or-down vote. It took a tilted-to-the-GOP compromise fashioned by so-called moderates in both parties to thwart (perhaps temporarily) Frist's desire to eliminate the judicial filibuster. Any fight over a Bush nominee to the Supreme Court will eventually have to come down to a with-us or-against-us vote. That means if Bush nominates someone who the Democrats believe warrants a filibuster, there will be a replay of the nuclear option drama. Only this time it will be more dramatic. The Democrats will threaten a filibuster; Frist will threaten the nuclear option. And those same six or so Republicans whom the Democrats tried (and failed) to win over as a bloc on the nuclear option fight will again be the targets for the Democratic leaders. But what would make these GOPers side with the Democrats this time, especially when the stakes are higher? And, unlike the last episode, these Republicans will not be saved by the bell of a compromise that kicks the can down the road (to mix metaphors). There will be more pressure on them to stick to the party line when a Supreme Court nomination is at stake.

Right on the money...