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**Written by Doug Powers

Kentucky Senator Rand Paul continues his filibuster against the nomination of John Brennan to be the director of the CIA until questions have been answered regarding the constitutionality of drone strikes on U.S. citizens on U.S. soil without due process. The filibuster, which began at about 11:45 a.m. Wednesday, has been interesting (Paul’s actually discussing the issues at hand and not just standing there reading the DC phone book or anything like that).

Twitter is buzzing with the #Filiblizzard hashtag (update: #StandWithRand is trending #1 right now), and Paul’s being joined by a few fellow Republican Senators such as Rubio, Lee, Cruz, Cornyn and Chambliss who are offering lengthy questions/statements to give him a breather at the podium. It’s still unclear if Paul’s using a bladder buddy.

The filibuster is being streamed live on C-Span’s website.

Will Paul eclipse Strom Thurmond’s filibuster record (back when Strom was a Democrat trying to stop the Civil Rights Act of 1957)?

Earlier Harry Reid tried to end the filibuster but it didn’t work. As a nod to Harry I think Rand should include a verse or two of cowboy poetry in his filibuster.

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz has referred to it as a “modern day ‘Mr. Smith Goes To Washington,’” so with that in mind, here’s a clip from the classic:

Socialist Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders fades into history:

.@senrandpaul has surpassed @sensanders‘ Dec 2010 #filibuster (8hrs 34min) by an hour.Watch LIVE on C-SPAN2 cs.pn/C2LIVE

— CSPAN (@cspan) March 7, 2013

Twitchy has lots more filiblizzard action here.

Related: Earlier Wednesday, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz did manage — after a bit of a struggle — to get Eric Holder to admit that the Constitution does not allow a drone strike on a U.S. citizen on domestic soil who is not posing an imminent threat.

Update: The White House is remaining silent on the Rand Paul filibuster. The optimist in me hopes that’s because Jay Carney has been furloughed due to the sequester, but unfortunately I doubt it.

Wildly rhetorical question: Will the Democrats who criticized the Bush/Cheney drone policies #StandWithPaul tonght? A liberal actor is asking the same question.

Update: Paul held the floor for almost 13 hours. Here’s how it ended:

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe