By Craig Robinson

Congressman Bruce Braley appeared in The Insiders with Dave Price on Sunday.  The show airs on WHO TV in Des Moines before Meet the Press.

In the interview, Price asked Braley how is it possible the Senate hasn’t passed a budget in nearly four years. Braley responded, “How is that possible? One word: the filibuster.”

The problem with Congressman Braley’s answer is that there is nothing for the Republicans to even filibuster.  Democrats in the U.S. Senate haven’t even drafted a budget in the last four years.  Maybe Congressman Braley doesn’t remember, but it was big news when Democrats in the Senate announced they would draft a budget back in late January.

And the President’s budgets the last few years have failed to even get a single vote in the Senate.  Democrats, not just Republicans are refusing to vote for the President’s budget.  In 2011, Senators were unanimous in theirdislike of the Obama budget.  That year 97 senators voted against the President’s budget.  In May of 2012, 99 senators voted against the President’s budget blueprint.

What’s even funnier is that this doesn’t even take into consideration that one actually can’t even filibuster a budget in the Senate because of reconciliation rules.

I don’t know if Congressman Braley is a little rusty, confused, or is simply comfortable just making things up, but Iowans deserve to know what’s really going on in Washington.  Apparently Congressman Braley believes that Iowans just want more political attacks, more pointing fingers at the other party, and more negative campaigning.

If Braley is the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee‘s chosen candidate for Iowa, they have pretty low standards, or if not, they may be wise to keep looking for other candidates.