Senator Carl Levin, retiring after 35 years in Congress (leaving an opportunity for the Republicans to take over his Senate seat) took to the floor for 20 minutes (followed by Jeff Sessions) on the dangers brought forth by the venomous snake of the Senate and his power grab over filibusters. The transcript is an archive keeper, and a lesson for all who would listen to clear minds of reason during the heat of political rhetoric and arm-twisting; especially when it involves your own party. Three important points stressed by Sen. Levin come to mind:

1) “What this is all about is ends and means. Pursuing the nuclear option in this manner removes an important check on majority overreach. As Senator Vandenberg said, if a Senate majority decides to pursue its aims unrestrained by the rules, we will have sacrificed a professed, vital principle for the sake of momentary convenience.”

2) “No Senate majority before us has assumed to change the rules at the will of the majority. Before we do something that cannot easily be undone — and we have now done it — before we discard the uniqueness of this great institution, let us use the current rules and precedents of the Senate to end the abuse of the filibuster. Surely we owe that much to this great and unique institution.”

3) “In the short term, judges will be confirmed who should be confirmed. But when the precedent is set, the majority of this body can change the rules at will — which is what the majority did today — if it can be changed on judges or on other nominees, this precedent is going to be used, I fear, to change the rules on consideration of legislation. And down the road — we don’t know how far down the road; we never know that in a democracy — but, down the road, the hard-won protections and benefits for our people’s health and welfare will be lost.”

The full video and transcript right here…