In case you missed it, the Bunning travesty of last week ended relatively happily yesterday, at least in the big picture of Senate battles.
The Senate approved $140 billion in extended tax breaks and unemployment benefits on Wednesday in a largely partisan vote.
The bill was approved on a 62-36 vote, with six Republicans joining most Democrats in backing it....
Most of the cost in the bill approved by the Senate goes toward prolonging increased levels of federal unemployment aid and COBRA healthcare benefits for the jobless through the end of December. The cost of those extensions is about $80 billion.
The House has some issues with this bill, namely that it doesn't include the infrastructure spending and aid to states and localities that were included in the $154 billion bill passed last December by the House, and that it relies heavily on tax cuts. Reid says he will bring up a jobs bill that includes those measures eventually, but given the pace of the Senate, the House seems skeptical.
As for the bill the Senate just passed, "Rep. Sandy Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said it’s “an open question” whether House members will force a conference to resolve differences between the two chambers." But what the forward movement on this bill shows is that, at least on jobs, Republican obstruction can be broken.
With Tennessee politics Harold was bored.
So he moved to a swank New York ward.
Then he met with Karl Rove
To discuss a Republican move.
Personally, I'd rather drive a Toyota than a Ford.
With Tennessee politics Harold was bored.
So he moved to a swank New York ward.
Then he met with Karl Rove
To discuss a Republican move.
Personally, I’d rather drive a Toyota than a Ford.
Who's going home tonight on American Idol? I sure hope it's not Crystal Bowersox or Lilli Scott. Tonight's results will leave the top 12 contestants, the real start of the season.
Who's going home on Survivor? I finally caught up with "24", Damages and The Good Wife. All were excellent this week. I even watched Molly and Jason's wedding last night. It was less schmaltzy than I thought it would be. Maybe it's just that compared to Jake and Vienna, Jason and Molly are a relief to watch. I hope Jakes gets eliminated in week one during DWTS. I'd rather watch Tom DeLay.
Washington - There is a pathetic quality to our discussion of deficits and fiscal responsibility because we never face up to how much we need government to do.
Our debates are also characterized by a politically convenient amnesia. Just a decade ago, we were running surpluses so big that Alan Greenspan, then chairman of the Federal Reserve, worried about what would happen once our national debt was liquidated. We had this problem well in hand until we started waging wars and cutting taxes at the same time.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid formally informed Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell Thursday that he will use the budgetary process of reconciliation to try and pass a final round of changes to the health care bill.
It's unclear when the legislation will come up for a vote. Reconciliation only requires a simply majority whereas Democrats would need to win 60 votes in order to bypass a Republican-led filibuster.
Yesterday, at long last, there was a vigorous debate about the war in Afghanistan on the floor of the United States House of Representatives. The legislative vehicle was a resolution introduced by Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich calling for US troops to be withdrawn from Afghanistan by the end of the year. But House critics of the war have long been agitating for a real debate.
We recently learned that Harry Reid (D-NV) and Dick Durbin (D-IL) were actually whipping against the public option and trying to deny the American people a real up-or-down vote on the issue in the Senate. It is good to see that Bernie Sanders (D-VT) is willing to defy them and instead go with the will of the American people.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) (photo: truthout.org via Flickr)
We recently learned that Harry Reid (D-NV) and Dick Durbin (D-IL) were actually whipping against the public option and trying to deny the American people a real up-or-down vote on the issue in the Senate. It is good to see that Bernie Sanders (I-VT) is willing to defy them and instead go with the will of the American people. From Greg Sargent:
“I think somebody should do that, and I’d certainly be prepared to do that,” Sanders told me when I asked him if he’d be willing to commit to introducing a public option amendment. This is, in effect, a commitment to introduce the amendment if no one else does.
As I have explained earlier, if even one senator offers a public option amendment, and it is ruled germane, it would likely get an up-or-down vote as part of the reconciliation vote-a-rama. Designing a public option/public program buy-in that would be ruled germane and does not violate the Byrd rule should definitely be possible.
Durbin’s argument against the public option amendment, or any other smart, pro-consumer, Democratic amendments, is that they could endanger passage of the reconciliation bill if it is sent back to the House. Given that Republican sources are saying the Senate parliamentarian ruled the House must first pass the comprehensive Senate health care bill before the reconciliation fixes can be taken up, the fear that the public option amendment could derail the reconciliation fixes seem strange.
If it gets to that point, Durbin will already have the health care reform bill he originally voted for signed into law. The reconciliation fixes are minor, and clearly not overly important to Durbin, since he already voted for a bill with all the “problems” in it. Since Durbin does not want the very important student loan reform bill as part of reconciliation, there is no reason to actually worry about the fate of the reconciliation sidecar bill from his stand point.
It's interesting that they didn't get it in writing and leaked it to the DC publication Roll Call instead of forcing a statement into the open: The Senate Parliamentarian has ruled that President Barack Obama must sign Congress’ original health care reform bill before the Senate can act on a companion reconciliation package, senior GOP sources said Thursday. This would disrupt the strategy to act on reconciliation before passing the full health care bill. The House simply does not trust the Senate to get the job done, and members also don't want to have to take a vote on the Senate bill and its various distasteful deals. The idea before was to make a "self-executing" rule where the House would pass the reconciliation sidecar and "assume the Senate bill to have passed. According to these GOP sources, the Parliamentarian said they cannot do that.
photo: Sandy Girl via Flickr
It’s interesting that they didn’t get it in writing and leaked it to the DC publication Roll Call instead of forcing a statement into the open.
The Senate Parliamentarian has ruled that President Barack Obama must sign Congress’ original health care reform bill before the Senate can act on a companion reconciliation package, senior GOP sources said Thursday.
The Senate Parliamentarian’s Office was responding to questions posed by the Republican leadership. The answers were provided verbally, sources said.
This would disrupt the strategy to act on reconciliation before passing the full health care bill. The House simply does not trust the Senate to get the job done, and members also don’t want to have to take a vote on the Senate bill and its various distasteful deals. The idea before was to make a “self-executing” rule where the House would pass the reconciliation sidecar and “assume the Senate bill to have passed. According to these GOP sources, the Parliamentarian said they cannot do that.
There are still options to ensure the reconciliation changes. The President could wait on the signing of the bills until a reconciliation package is introduced, for example. And Harry Reid’s letter to Mitch McConnell would at least signal the Senate’s determination, reassuring House members. But they may still have to take a hard swallow on that Senate bill, although Republicans facing them in November would probably just lie and say they voted for all manner of nonsense regardless of what they do. Really that should not be a concern to any politician, what other people might put in a campaign ad.
Again, we have no way of knowing if this is true. You have unnamed GOP sources claiming that the Parliamentarian told them something verbally. A Senate Democratic leadership aide offered no comment on this. Nobody’s really talking publicly or on the record. So, until then, I’d view this with skepticism.
The road to passage actually got even tougher today.
Regarding this TPM piece on James Dobson being forced out of Focus on the Family, all I have to say is that people probably shouldn't be putting too much faith in anything Ken Hutcherson says, since he has almost no influence or knowledge of events.
The Family Research Council is calling for an investigation into the Eric Massa scandal.
Finally, the AFA's Bryan Fischer goes after VA Gov. Bob McDonnell: "Bob McDonnell won the governorship of Virginia last November by campaigning as a social and cultural conservative, and pledging to uphold conservative social values. That pledge lasted about 54 days, shorter even than the shelf life of most of President Obama's empty promises."
It is too bad that Ralph Reed decided not to run for Congress because, given his views, style, ego, and past, it would have made for a never-ending steam of blog posts.
As it is, we'll have to settle for writing posts about his decison not to run, which he discussed yesterday with Denny Schaffer with WGKA (920AM) and explained that his focus at the moment is on building his Faith and Freedom Coalition which he claims is adding one new state affiliate per week and one thousand new members a day and is "growing faster than the Christian Coalition was growing in the 90s."
Reed stated that, come November, when people conservative victories rolling across this nation like a wave, they'll know he made the right decision to focus on the Faith and Freedom Coalition, pointing to the massive impact the group claims to have had in both Virginia and New Jersey, claiming to have reached more than one million voters through "largest and most ambitious conservative get-out-the-vote effort in the modern history of either state," resulting in an eight-point increase in turnout among born-again Christians and a seven-point increase among conservative voters.
"I realized that I couldn’t do both. I had to decide. I was either going to help put 50 to 100 people like me in the U.S. Senate, Congress and state houses, or I was going to spend the next eight or nine months focusing solely on me. I ultimately decided the country was more important than me having a congressional seat.”
...
"It would be pretty exciting if I could be part of a freshman class that was back in the majority in the House. Had I done that, and had I won, I think I could have been an impact player in Congress.”
Not limited to or by established, traditional,
orthodox, or authoritarian attitudes, views, or dogmas; free from bigotry.
Favoring proposals for reform, open to new
ideas for progress, and tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others;
broad-minded.
Of, relating to, or characteristic of
liberalism.
Liberal Of, designating, or
characteristic of a political party founded on or associated with principles
of social and political liberalism, especially in Great Britain, Canada, and
the United States.
