I'm not succeeding very well.
The reason for that is that, after six years of a lack of a 60-seat reliable majority, meaning the Dems could only get Senate measures even up for a vote by getting a few GOP Senators to sign on (and by reining in their own Blue Dogs), the GOP now faces precisely the same problem. They only hold 54 seats, meaning the Dems can now use threatened fillibuster — the Great Tool of Fighting Injustice and Tyranny that the GOP so frequently invoked — to block any bills they choose to put forward (even if they can come up with bills that the Tea Party wing will agree with, making it even less likely they can get Dems to sign on).
The reason I'm even trying to restrain the schadenfreude is because this remains emblematic of a sick government, once so polarized that it simply cannot function on even such straightforward proposals as keeping parts of the government going. I can chortle at, understand, and even applaud the Dems now being the "obstructor" — but in the long run, both sides will need to reach compromise.
I may think there's more compromise that needs to come from the GOP not-quite-so-conservatives, but there are going to to be bitter pills to swallow all around.
On the other and, it's hard not to read a paragraph like this and not just start to laugh and laugh …
'Part of the problem that some Senate Republicans find so frustrating is that their colleagues in the House do not always seem to appreciate that a majority in the Senate does not mean that the party controls every outcome.'
When YOU are in power, bipartisanship and co-operation means you doing what we want.
When WE are in power, bipartisanship and co-operation means you doing what we want.