The fun is imagining them having to deny it

This is other bloggers' work; I'm just passing it along.

But just for grins and giggles, imagine how much fun it would be to be a Democrat running against a Republican in 2006 if you could point to the record demonstrating that the Senate Repubs had voted:

• To increase the number of abortions
• To cut benefits to veterans
• To increase our national debt
• To keep oil prices high
• To decrease funding for education
• Against job benefits for the average working American
• To keep the Saudis in control of our energy supply
• To increase corporate welfare
• Against funding for the troops

It just might happen. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid--who really does seem to get how the game is played much more than his polite-to-a-fault predecessor Tom Daschle--is letting it be known what happens when the radical right starts monkeying with the Senate rules

In a nutshell, if Senators start ignoring long-standing rules of senatorial courtesy to let the Republicans do away with the filibuster--the only remaining mechanism for the minority party to stop wildly partisan legislation (or appointees) from being steamrolled through the approval process--the same slash-and-burn logic might also allow the Democrats begin to introduce legislation that is absolutely not on the GOP agenda.

As Drum suggests, these Democratic measures don't have a prayer of passage, but isn't it lovely to imagine forcing the Republicans to go on record voting against them?

It reminds me of a story told by P. J. O'Rourke--at that time better known for being the former editor of the National Lampoon during the era when it was funny than for being one of the B-team panelists, along with Moe Rocca, on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me--at a lecture at his alma mater Miami University, about 30 years ago. I haven't been able to establish if the story's true, and I'm not inclined retell it here, but you can get the drift by Googling "Lyndon Johnson" and "pig."