The Senate Is Where Policy Goes to Die

The Senate died a little more on Tuesday. This time it was Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who said of the Robert Mueller protection legislation, "I'm the one who decides what we take to the floor, that's my responsibility as the majority leader, we will not be having this on the floor of the Senate."

It's true that the majority leader has the ability to call up bills. But while I hate to sound like an old fogy, once upon a time -- fairly recently, really -- any senator could get a vote on almost anything he or she really cared about. They might do that by filibustering other bills or nominations until the majority agreed to bring up an item. Or a senator could just offer his or her pet bill as an amendment to something else.