Robertson, Dobson, Kennedy and Co. must have Frist on speed-dial--almost as fast as Reid put forward a deal to get an up-or-down vote on one of Shrub's nominees,
Frist turned it down.
Democrats and Republicans in the Senate busied themselves on Monday with increasingly intense gamesmanship in the fight over President Bush's judicial choices.
The Democrats, eager to demonstrate that they do not oppose all his choices for federal appeals courts, offered an immediate vote on Thomas B. Griffith of Utah, Mr. Bush's relatively uncontroversial nominee for the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
[...]
The Republicans declined, interested in maintaining indignation over other blocked nominees to fortify themselves to change the filibuster rules.
The majority leader, Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, said there should be a floor vote on all the nominees.
"All of this obstruction must stop," Dr. Frist said. "It is hurting the nominees. It is hurting the Senate. It is hurting the American people."
Hmmm ... I guess it's safe to say the Lott/Bill Nelson deal is dead too. And if Lott and his five colleagues are serious about voting against the nuclear option if there's no deal, Frist just got a ton of egg in his face.
I have a good idea who Lott's five partners were on this deal--Sununu, Grassley, Gregg, Smith and Warner. The first four, in particular, are pretty big nyets--I'd had them all in the "hit the button!" column for a long time.
Update [2005-5-10 11:45:56 by Christian Dem in NC]:The Hill reports Lott's backing away from his own deal. If the scuttlebutt out of Washington is true and Lott's using this to position himself for a run at Repub whip when McConnell ascends to Repub leader, methinks Lott is already kowtowing to the religious right.
