I am sure someone smarter than I am has come up with this idea before, and also all the reasons it could never work, but a thought occurred to me during tonight’s State of the Union about how we can address the sticky problem of the filibuster, and it is summed up in the following poorly written haiku:

one filibuster
per senator, per lifetime;
make them play in pairs.

Each senator gets one filibuster for life, and filibusters have to be joint ventures conducted by a pair of crazy obsessed determined senators, not just one.

Maybe also they have to speak alternating words – one word per person at a time, like an improv game.

Maybe also they have to speak in blank verse.

I know this plan would probably work better if Congress were a board game and not the way we make our laws, but so what (hmm, Congress: The Board Game? If I ever try to make up a government from scratch, remind me to test-run all my ideas in board game format). The real problem, I think, is that the filibuster is just too great a word/institution/quirk of our country’s particular way of doing things to do away with it completely.

Oh, America!