Reid Folds

This is very, very funny. The Republican backed amendment to the ethics reform bill in the Senate appears to have been accepted. Harry Reid got smoked on this one.

With this CQ article ($), it seems like this is official. What's thoroughly surprising is that the new DeMint Amendment is even stronger than the original one. Excerpt:

After losing a critical floor vote Thursday and scrambling in vain to reverse the decision, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., found the spirit of bipartisan compromise more to his liking Friday morning.

Reid offered an olive branch to Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., agreeing to embrace his amendment to a pending ethics and lobbying overhaul (S 1) with some modifications. DeMint’s amendment, which Democratic leaders tried but failed to kill on Thursday, would expand the definition of member earmarks that would be subject to new disclosure rules.

[...] Reid admitted Friday that he was caught off guard when nine Democrats and independent Joseph I. Lieberman voted against his motion to table, or kill, the DeMint amendment. His effort failed, 46-51.

[...] Friday morning, a chastened Reid said, “Yesterday was a rather difficult day, as some days are. We tend to get in a hurry around here sometimes when we shouldn’t be. Personally, for the majority, we probably could have done a little better job.”

Translation: "Jim DeMint sucker punched us and we look really, really bad right now. The Republicans offered meaningful reform and the Senate Democratic leadership tried to stop it. And fumbled that, too." DeMint is not my Senator and I really have not followed his career, but he just pulled off a major win here. This was a very, very slick move politically.