Browse Research and Commentary

The Do-little House of Representatives: Why so Little legislating?

April 4, 2013, Sarah A. Binder

Droning on: Thoughts on the Rand Paul “Talking Filibuster”

March 7, 2013, Sarah A. Binder

Are the Days of the Hastert Rule Numbered? Some Caution in Reading the House

March 1, 2013, Sarah A. Binder

Would Congress Care if the Federal Reserve Lost Money? A Lesson from History

February 26, 2013, Sarah A. Binder

Sequestration Stalemate: Some More Considerations

February 26, 2013, Sarah A. Binder

There's a defense wing of defense hawks, and they've been pretty vocal about the impact on the Defense Department and national security, generally. And we know there's a hard-core group as well that's opposed to any and all revenue increases. And between the two of those, there's no agreed-upon path of what to do, and so it looks like they may prefer the sequester to any alternative — certainly the alternatives the Democrats are offering up.

February 21, 2013, Sarah A. Binder, National Public Radio

Thoughts on the Hagel Filibuster and its Political Implications

February 14, 2013, Sarah A. Binder

Brookings Expert Roundtable on President Obama’s State of the Union Priorities

February 7, 2013, Sarah A. Binder, William A. Galston, Ron Haskins and Thomas E. Mann

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Take a Little, Give a Little: The Senate's Effort at Filibuster Reform

January 24, 2013, Sarah A. Binder

Prospects for the 113th Congress

January 21, 2013, Sarah A. Binder

Oh 113th Congress Hastert Rule, We Hardly Knew Ye!

January 17, 2013, Sarah A. Binder

[Filibustering of a presidential nominee is] just sort of emblematic of senators pushing their powers here into an area where we traditionally said that senators are willing to defer to the president.

January 11, 2013, Sarah A. Binder, National Public Radio

A Congress Nerd’s Super Bowl: Watching the Fiscal Cliff Game

January 2, 2013, Sarah A. Binder

Reforming the Senate at a Snail’s Pace

December 30, 2012, Sarah A. Binder

Three Reforms to Unstick the Senate

November 29, 2012, Sarah A. Binder

I suspect that in a war of wills between the parties [in Congress], an intense minority might prevail. After all, the majority typically has a full agenda on its plate and is just as likely to want to move on to other issues [giving in to the filibuster] as it is to battle it out with the minority.

November 17, 2012, Sarah A. Binder, Washington Post

The Lame Duck Congress — A Live Web Chat with Sarah Binder

November 14, 2012

The picture in the House [of Representatives] is more of the same, which is Republicans pushing things to the right and Democrats to the left. Most of the damage has already been done to the center.

November 7, 2012, Sarah A. Binder, Washington Times

“Accelerated Regular Order” — Could it Lead the Parties to a Grand Bargain?

October 19, 2012, Sarah A. Binder

Boehner and [House Majority Whip Kevin] McCarthy had to work really hard to convince some of the freshmen that shutting down the government was not a strategy they should take seriously...And during the debt-ceiling crisis in the summer of 2011, they had to bring in outside experts to convince them that default was not an option.

October 12, 2012, Sarah A. Binder, McClatchy

Will Congress Heed the Voters in the Lame Duck Session?

October 3, 2012, Sarah A. Binder

Consensus on Monetary Policy at the Federal Reserve

September 13, 2012, Sarah A. Binder

Congress Before the Election: A Live Web Chat with Sarah Binder

September 12, 2012

I am hard pressed to find another Congress in recent memory that has really stumbled along the way this Congress has...This close to the election no one wants to be taking tough votes. They will take some votes that bolster the party's reputation with their constituencies.

September 10, 2012, Sarah A. Binder, U.S. News & World Report

We rarely see protests [within the Democratic Party]. They have much more serious and pragmatic delegates who are in the game for winning, not for ideologically purity...I don’t know if we’d say the same thing about the Republican Party today, given that it does have a strong libertarian wing to it.

September 4, 2012, Sarah A. Binder, Washington Times