So some Kerry and Kennedy hasve pledged to filibuster against Alito's Supreme Court nomination. Not being an American and having only recently become at all interested in politics I thought I should look up exactly what a filibuster is. It turns out that the Senate website has a nice background article on it, and the related "Cloture", a two-thirds majority vote that can cut off a filibuster debate.
It doesn't ellude the record for number of times various parties have used the filibuster which is unfortunate, because I have a feeling that Republicans, fond that they are for threatening to "go nuclear" and pass rules to outlaw filibuster completely, are actually those most likely to use it. If I come across such statistics I'll let you know. However the Senate article does highlight the record holder for the longest filibuster in the house:
The record for the longest individual speech goes to South Carolina's J. Strom Thurmond who filibustered for 24 hours and 18 minutes against the Civil Rights Act of 1957.
Way to go Strom, I bet he must have been proud of that record to his dying day.
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