Can you hear me NOW?
Anne and I were up until after 1:00 a.m. watching the livestream of the Texas Senate last night, riveted by the drama and tweeting like mad people. We weren’t alone. At 1:00 a.m. ET, there were nearly 200,000 people watching the livestream.
In the end, I ended up with three new heroes yesterday, all of them Texas Democrats. Wendy Davis staged a one-woman, 11-hour filibuster where she was not allowed to eat, drink, take bathroom breaks, or even lean on the podium. It was nothing short of legislative heroism. Davis was also compelled to make her comments “germane”. She was allowed two strikes and, on the third, was ruled out of order. What followed was two hours of amazing Democratic awesomeness as her colleagues challenged the Neanderthal Republicans who were trying to set the clock back several decades.
Two Dems in particular, Royce West and Kirk Watson, led the charge, speaking slowly and deliberately and citing the rule book that the Republicans seemed willing to disregard.
I have several new heroes today and they are all Texas Dems: @KirkPWatson @wendydavistexas @senroycewest#sb5 #standwithwendy #txlege
— Chris Savage (@Eclectablog) June 26, 2013
At the very end, with just minutes to go, the crowd of mostly orange-clad women in the gallery began shouting so loud that the Republicans were unable to take a vote — “The People’s Filibuster”.
It would appear that women have the ability to shut this whole thing down in the #txlege #sb5 #standwithwendy
— Chris Savage (@Eclectablog) June 26, 2013
This quote from the Washington Post tells you all you need to know about how desperate and unethical Texas Republicans are:
Initially, Republicans insisted the vote started before the midnight deadline and passed the bill that Democrats spent the day trying to kill. But after official computer records and printouts of the voting record showed the vote took place Wednesday, and then were changed to read Tuesday, senators retreated into a private meeting to reach a conclusion.
It was an historical evening, without question.
By the way, one of the things that Republicans claimed wasn’t “germane” to the issue of abortion was forced ultrasounds.
Yes, they were that desperate.
Texas: Got a gun? That's cool, carry on. Got a vagina? I'm sorry ma'am we're gonna have to regulate that. #SB5 #texlege
— Anne C. Savage (@Anne_Savage) June 26, 2013
