The filibuster, a parliamentary practice in the U.S. Senate allowing members in the minority to block the will of the majority, has been around in one form or another since long before you were born.

Will it outlive us all? There's a solid chance of that, given the power of inertia in our federal government, even in these times of heightened partisanship. But will it also be whittled down, chip by chip, into something smaller and less powerful? That's already happening.

Vice President Kamala Harris reignited the long-running debate about the filibuster Tuesday during a radio interview in Wisconsin when she proposed abolishing the practice, which requires 60 of the Senate's 100 members to agree to end debate so a particular piece of legislation can come up for a vote.

Harris narrowly tailored her position to abortion rights, proposing to reset as federal law the protections for abortion that existed under Roe v. Wade until the U.S. Supreme Court overturned that five-decades-old precedent two years ago.

Abortion is a powerful motivator for voters in November's election because the Republican nominee, former President Donald Trump, has bragged about appointing three of the Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe. So Harris is upping the ante in that debate, which helps keep it churning in the national conversation.

But Harris has been fluid on the filibuster, offering support to protect it when she wasn't trying to kill it.

Harris didn't offer much detail during her radio interview about how she would use the filibuster to restore the rights lost when Roe was overturned. Her campaign later told me her intentions for the filibuster were "specific" to abortion........

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