Sen. Bunning filibusters, kills DoT, Unemployment, more.

[Rahvin]

Let him. Every day this goes on fifty thousand unemployed or fearful of being unemployed workers give up on the Republicans because of this idiot. Then there are all the DOT workers he essentially laid off, all by himself.

Reid is, and should be, milking this, at least till the end of the week. If they pass it by Friday, it shouldn't affect benefits so long as they make the law retroactive, which they are.

I'd agree with you completely if people weren't goignto directly suffer from this.

But delaying those benefit extensions and funding for the DOT means that whatever teh Democrats will gain in political capital from this douche move, thousands of real people will be paying for it in misery.

I'd be pissed if a majority vote in Congress killed unemployment extensions. But one guy filibustering without even being made to keep talking to hold the floor? I'm outraged.

Is there any good reason to keep filibusters in the legislative playbook? Every time somebody uses the word, it's been for a reason that makes me remember that so-called "nuclear option" that was discussed not so long ago.

[eion]

Democrats are reluctant to remove the filibuster because they know one day they'll be in the minority again. It's the same reason Republicans only threatened to use the "nuclear option."

Republicans are just better at party organization and bluffing it seems.

As to real people suffering, I agree that to prolong this is immoral and criminal, but one week should not affect benefits, so long as eligibility dates and actual paid benefits are retroactive. If Reid called for cloture he'd probably get 65 to 75 votes for it, and I think he knows that, so he's trying to get what he can from this before he shuts Bunning down.

Hopefully Bunning (and other idiots like him) will be shamed and scared enough not to try this shit again. I would suggest that Reid also maintain tighter controls on the quorum, which is how this all started, but it is hard to keep 51 senators within reach of the floor at all times, especially leading into the weekend.

[FSTargetDrone]

Minor update:

March 2, 2010

Republicans Look for Way Past Bunning’s Blockade

By CARL HULSE

WASHINGTON - Senator Jim Bunning, who is not running for re-election this year, appears willing to take the heat for holding up unemployment benefits and shutting down highway construction projects around the country. Other Senate Republicans, who are hoping for big political gains this year, are not so eager.

With Mr. Bunning’s objection to extending jobless aid quickly become a national cause célèbre, his colleagues were trying to find a quick resolution to an impasse that is not only having direct consequences on some of their constituents, but also doing some political damage to the Republican brand as well.

Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader and Mr. Bunning’s home-state colleague in Kentucky, said Tuesday that the Senate leadership was trying to reach an agreement that would result in Mr. Bunning’s dropping his insistence that the $10 billion cost of the jobless benefits be covered by money from the economic stimulus bill.

And Senator Susan Collins of Maine, a moderate Republican colleague of the conservative Mr. Bunning, joined Democrats in trying to force the measure through, calculating that perhaps a plea from a fellow Republican would get him to change his position. She was wrong.

“When I was home this weekend, I talked to constituents who expressed their utter bafflement that Congress could not proceed on something that has widespread support,” Ms. Collins said.

While trying to blame Democrats for mishandling the entire matter, other Republicans distanced themselves from Mr. Bunning, who Democrats were trying to make into the poster child for what they say has been a maddening and persistent pattern of Republican obstruction in the Senate.

“This is one senator,” said Senator John Cornyn of Texas, a chief political strategist for Senate Republicans. “This does not represent the position of the caucus.”

Republicans were not just unhappy that the fight was allowing Democrats, editorial writers and activists around the country to portray them as heartless, denying jobless aid to struggling Americans while Mr. Bunning complained that late-night debate was preventing him from watching a college basketball game.

The attention to the impasse was also cutting into Republican efforts to focus on the Democratic strategy on the health care overhaul, which Republicans are trying to portray as an end-run around Senate rules. Complicating the situation was the fact that Mr. McConnell and Mr. Bunning have a tortured relationship since Mr. McConnell was instrumental last year in discouraging Mr. Bunning from seeking another term.

Not all Republicans were busily engaged in Bunning-bashing. “Jim Bunning is my hero,” said Senator Jim DeMint, the conservative Republican from South Carolina.

The White House, meanwhile, called Mr. Bunning’s actions “irrational.”

“I don’t know how you negotiate with the irrational,” Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, told reporters at an informal morning briefing. “I don’t know how you prevent one person who decides they hold in the palm of their hand the livelihood of hundreds of thousands who have lost their jobs.”

Mr. Gibbs’s criticism was couched in unusually strong language at a time when the administration is trying to be seen as searching for bipartisan comity.

Mr. Gibbs also defended not applying the pay-as-you-go rules — the Congressional rules that usually require spending to be offset by revenue or cuts elsewhere — to the extension of benefits, saying “this is an emergency situation.”

Ms. Collins, who took the floor shortly after the Senate convened, said her effort was being made on “behalf of numerous members of the Republican caucus who have expressed concerns to me.”

“There are 500 Mainers whose benefits expired on Sunday,” Ms. Collins said. But Mr. Bunning, her colleague, continued to lodge his objection.

Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, again urged Mr. Bunning to reconsider, saying his push to pay for the $10 billion costs of the added coverage out of stimulus money had been heard.

“His point has been made,” Mr. Reid said.

Robert Pear and Peter Baker contributed reporting.

[FSTargetDrone]

All better now!

Mar 02, 2010

Sen. Bunning's one-man filibuster is over

Lawmakers have reached an agreement to end the one-man filibuster by Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Ky., that has blocked an extension of health and unemployment benefits since last week.

The Senate will take a series of votes Tuesday night, culminating in a final vote on the $10 billion bill. The legislation would provide a 30-day extension of federal employment benefits for the unemployed as well as a 65% subsidy to help people who have lost their job pay for health insurance under the COBRA program.

Bunning has argued that the measure should be paid for, which it currently is not. He had previously suggested using leftover money from the economic stimulus bill. On Tuesday, he said he would support a Democratic proposal to end a bio-fuel tax credit for "black liquor," a byproduct of the paper making process, which budget analysts have predicted could save $24 billion over 10 years.

"We cannot keep adding to the debt and passing the buck," Bunning said. "What matters is that we get our spending problems under control."

Throughout the day Tuesday, Democrats had been threatening to keep the Senate open all night, a move that would have forced Bunning to remain on the floor if he wanted to continue to block the measure.

With hundreds of thousands of people expected to lose benefits this week, Democrats have spent the past several days holding up the impasse as an example of Republican attempts to block Democratic legislation. The Democratic National Committee blasted 16 e-mails to reporters on Tuesday decrying Bunning's blockade.

Update 7:12 p.m. ET. "I'm glad we were able to work this out and move on with the business of the Senate," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said.

Update 7:21 p.m. ET. "I will be back on future spending bills demanding that they be paid for," Bunning said.

Here's an earlier On Politics item with more information about Bunning's recent effort.

(Posted by John Fritze)

[SirNitram]

All better now!

Oh yes. No one could've possibly suffered for the fact they've already been furloughed, kicked off Unemployment, failed to make their bills, or lose COBRA coverage permenantly.

Thank god we have the GOP a day late and a dollar short. Otherwise someone might uphold that pesky 'The General Welfare' bit in the Constitution.

[eion]

This is a bill that has already passed the house. Bunnin's ammendment, if it passed, would force it to either be sent to the House to be voted on, or for the bills to go to a conference committee to settle the changes.

Bunning can still delay this bill by weeks if he wants.

[Master of Ossus]

Here's The Onion's take on this.

Senator Dikembe Mutombo Blocks Record Amount Of Legislation

WASHINGTON—Sen. Dikembe Mutombo (R-CO) showed that he is still one of the most dominant big men in Congress Thursday, blocking a record 16 bills in one legislative session.

The 7-foot-2 senator, who broke the record previously held by Sen. Shawn Bradley (D-NJ), Rep. Arvydas Sabonis (D-OR), and current Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), batted away legislation left and right, sometimes swatting bills so hard that they were sent flying all the way back to committee.

Mutombo punctuated his final block, a clean rejection of the Criminal Justice Reinvestment Act, with his signature finger wag.

"He stuffed the new jobs bill right back in Harry Reid's face," Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) told reporters. "And then when Reid tried to put the bill back up for consideration, Sen. Mutombo blocked it a second and then a third time. That's when I knew he had a chance at the record."

"He just completely dominates the Senate floor," McCain added.

His biggest rejection came 20 minutes into the first half of the session when 5-foot-10 Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) had his Peace Corps Improvement and Expansion Act emphatically slapped away by a leaping Mutombo. Following the rejection, Mutombo glared at Dodd from the Senate podium and said, "Get that weak-ass legislation out of my house," in a yell that was reportedly heard in the top rows of the Senate Chamber.

"You don't mind giving up the blocks record to a talent like Mutombo," said Sen. McConnell, who is still considered the Republican floor leader. "Some say he's too centrist, and he may take that position at times, but the fact is he can get stuff struck down like nobody's business."

Mutombo, who has been called a "force" by his Republican colleagues and is a key player in their legislative game plan, had a career-best nine blocks during the first half of Thursday's session. He easily rejected several appropriations bills, barely even getting off the Senate floor on two of them. For his 10th block of the day, he also got a piece of the Law Enforcement Officers Safety Act.

"He's like a brick wall out there," a visibly tired and sweaty Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) told reporters. "Sen. Mutombo's arms are so long that if legislation is introduced anywhere in his vicinity, he's probably going to knock it away. There's no way we are going to get health care through with Mutombo out there."

"You can try and alter your legislation or fake him out by attaching a rider to a bill, but in the end he's just too big," Kerry continued. "And fast. He's got surprisingly quick footwork."

Dikembe Mutombo Mpolondo Mukamba Jean-Jacques Wamutombo started his political career as a city councilman in Denver, quickly gaining a reputation as an elected official focused on getting that stuff out of here. Campaigning on a platform of defense, defense, defense, the popular Mutombo was elected to the State Legislature in 2002 and then to the U.S. Senate in 2006. According to Senate sources, the rookie lawmaker came out of nowhere to stuff Ted Kennedy's Vaccine Access and Supply Act "so far down the late senator's throat" that he easily won the respect of his Republican colleagues.

"He reminds me of myself out there, just rejecting stuff left and right," said former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN), who retired in 2007. "Even when he gets called an obstructionist, or for goaltending, he's established psychological dominance and made his point: You don't come through his part of the floor."

Though many Democratic senators have called Mutombo's legislative style extremely partisan, one-dimensional, and completely unfair, some of his colleagues across the aisle have praised Mutombo's willingness to assist them in getting their legislation through Congress.

"The thing about Mutombo is that, for a big man, he can actually pass bills really well," Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) said in reference to their bipartisan work on the Trade Act of 2007 and the Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act of 2008. "Because he's so tall, he sees the perimeter of the entire Senate floor and knows when a senator from the left or right might offer some weak-side help."

"Reminds me of a young Bill Bradley," Baucus added.

Such praise from Democratic lawmakers is rare, however, with many saying that Sen. Mutombo is directly responsible for the gridlock currently facing Washington.

"Sometimes I get the impression that he'll block something just because it's introduced by a Democrat or, quite frankly, just because he's taller than the rest of us," Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) told reporters. "Why else would he reject a resolution supporting stability in Sudan?"

Specter went on to express concern for the future of his party, saying that the only hope for getting meaningful legislation passed through Congress is to make sure Rep. Greg Ostertag (D-UT) is elected to the Senate during November's midterm election.

[Broomstick]

Let him. Every day this goes on fifty thousand unemployed or fearful of being unemployed workers give up on the Republicans because of this idiot.

So... the people who can't make their bills, those who go bankrupt, who lose everything they own, who are rendered homeless ... they don't matter?

Do you realize that my spouse and I eat only because of government benefits? If this sort of shit means that my monthly allotment is delayed I can not buy food. Now, as it happens, I was smart enough to stock up on various things over past months, but if our benefits are delayed a week there will be no milk or fruit left. After two weeks no more vegetables. We'll be eating oatmeal, canned ham, and canned vegetables. Three weeks, four at the max, there will be no food in my house and we will be hungry. You can't eat IOU's.

There are people who will reach that strait much, much sooner than we would, and who have fewer friends and family to help them.

This is not academic. There are people suffering right now because of Bunning's shennanigans. Every day that goes by it is more people falling further behind, more people hungry, more people out on the street.

You know, the homeless aren't allowed to register to vote. 50,000 people a day giving up on the Republicans mean nothing if they are disenfranchised.

[FSTargetDrone]

All better now!

Oh yes. No one could've possibly suffered for the fact they've already been furloughed, kicked off Unemployment, failed to make their bills, or lose COBRA coverage permenantly.

Thank god we have the GOP a day late and a dollar short. Otherwise someone might uphold that pesky 'The General Welfare' bit in the Constitution.

It's really sad that the Bunion had to be so damn obstinate and disruptive, just to make his sad little point on his way out. Too bad January is as far away as it is.