Jerry Brown on the filibuster

James Fallows did an extensive interview with California Gov. Jerry Brown in 2013. In part of it, Jerry addressed the Senate filibuster rule. Fallows gives this quote, shown here with the brackets and italics as in Fallows' post, The Atlantic Politics 05/26/2013:

We can't have a country based on the 60-vote standard. This is serious.

We've never had to have 60 votes for appointments or day-to day-decisions. Really, you can't govern that way. That's a radical change.

How can you govern? Does England have 60? [JF note: Obviously a rhetorical question. His point is that the U.S. has the drawbacks of parliamentary democracy, including political polarization -- without the benefits, namely the ability to get things done.] I think that 60 votes could end America's ability to govern itself. We have to get rid of it.

That 60 votes is bad.

He's right. The Republicans' extreme obstructionism these last six years of Obama's Presidency really is a drastic departure from the Congressional practice since probably the Civil War. "That's a radical change."

And the Republican Party today is a radical party.