To anybody who still thinks there is no difference between the Dems and Repukes

[kratos12]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100624/ap_on_bi_ge/us_congress_spending_22


Republicans kill Senate jobless aid measure

WASHINGTON – Republicans on Thursday defeated Democrats' showcase election-year jobs bill, including an extension of weekly unemployment benefits for more than a million people out of work more than six months.

The 57-41 vote fell three votes short of the 60 required to crack a GOP filibuster, delivering a major blow to President Barack Obama and Democrats facing big losses of House and Senate seats in the fall election.

The rejected bill would also have provided $16 billion in new aid to states, preserving the jobs of thousands of state and local government workers and providing what White House officials called an insurance policy against a double-dip recession. It also included dozens of tax breaks sought by business lobbyists, and tax increases on domestically produced oil and on investment fund managers.

The demise of the bill means that unemployment benefits will phase out for more than 200,000 people a week. Governors who had been counting on federal aid will now have to consider a fresh round of budget cuts, tax hikes and layoffs of state workers.

"This is a bill that would remedy serious challenges that American families face as a result of this Great Recession," said Max Baucus, D-Mont., the chief author of the bill. "This is a bill that works to build a stronger economy. This is a bill to put Americans back to work."

[rpannier]

1. Ben Nelson Nebraska voted with the Republicans

Kind of kills your OP

on edit: I'm the unrec

[kratos12]

6. Only a rigid ideologue

would come to that conclusion.

[rpannier]

9. How am I a rigid ideologue?

Nelson, Democrat from Nebraska, was one of the 41 to support the filibuster
He bears as much responsibility as the Republicans do, as he does for the massive tax breaks for the upper 1%

[murdoch]

17. You see reality instead of being an all-democrats-are-always-right line

That makes you an ideologue.

[stray cat]

20. I sure wish we could get a real conservative republican to replace him

in Nebraska - that would really be a great plan! :rofl:

[BrklynLiberal]

2. It never, never, never ever pays to try to deal with repukes.....

They make you take the heart out of any bill you want..and then vote against it anyway.


"Crestfallen Democrats tried in vain to win support from moderate Republicans Snowe, Collins and Scott Brown of Massachusetts. They voted in March to defeat a filibuster"It nev

[rpannier]

4. Should have worked harder on getting Nelson on board

He's supposedly a Democrat

[Sebastian Doyle]

3. Here we go with the 60 vote LIE again

57-41 should mean the vote PASSED.

Except Harry Reid is a spineless fucking coward.

[kratos12]

8. Again with blaming dems

while it's the repubes voting lockstep to HURT their fellow citizens just so they can try to undermine Obama politicallly.

Blaming Reid for this is liking blaming a rape victim for being in the wrong neighborhood, it excuses the actions of the guilty party.

[Sebastian Doyle]

11. Newsflash: Republicans vote against legislation that would actually help people

Why would THAT surprise you?

Here's the reality: Repukes have 41 votes. They cannot WIN anything, with the exception of being able to derail the override of a Presidential veto, which would actually require 67 votes.

Naturally, the likelihood of a Democratic president vetoing a bill passed by a Democratic congress is near zero. Which effectively means the Republicans cannot stop SHIT in the senate.

Except you have a spineless fucking coward majority "leader" who is afraid of a fillibuster.

Fuck that. Let the Repukes filibuster. Let THEM explain to the long term unemployed in their own goddamned districts why they voted against this.

And then pass the fucking bill anyway.

[noamnety]

10. I don't understand.

There was no filibuster? We just said oh, never mind, we only have 57 votes to your 41, so we won't even bother?

Why wouldn't the dems force republicans to come forward and filibuster a jobs bill?

[Sebastian Doyle]

12. Because Harry Reid is a spineless fucking coward.

That's the reason. There are no other excuses.

[LonePirate]

5. They are heartless slimeballs. I expect the filibuster rule to be repealed once the Rs have 51 votes

If Reid had any balls, he'd put the filibuster rule up for a vote now. You know damn well the Rs will eliminate as soon as they regain control of the Senate so they don't have to put up with the Ds blocking everything.

[tkmorris]

15. I think 67 votes are needed to change that

I believe a change in the Senate rules requires a 2/3 vote to pass. There might be some other procedure to accomplish the same thing, I don't know.

[Obamanaut]

18. Here's a real good post on filibuster/filibuster change in another thread

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=8626636#8626773


grantcart (1000+ posts)

3. You may find the following useful



The filibuster does not appear in the US constitution.

The word filibuster does not appear in the US Senate Rules.

The filibuster is a relatively recent invention in terms of actual use.

The filibuster can be undone by 51 votes.

All that is required is that at the begining of the new Senate the majority party introduce and pass a new set of rules allowing for the ending of debate with a simple majority vote.

Background here:
http://journals.democraticunderground.com/grantcart/274

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/grantcart/241

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/grantcart/234

[JuniperLea]

7. Their jobless constituents need knocked upside the head...

So they take notice!

[Octafish]

13. Let 'em filibuster.

Use the tape in the Fall.

[murdoch]

19. Absolutely

If they want to filibuster this, let them filibuster this. For a week, at least.

We'd probably have Ben Nelson (Democrat) doing the filibustering though....

Weakness from Harry Reid's end.

Then they could show it on the news - the Republicans, who just helped pass $750 billion in military spending for new bases in Colombia, are preventing a bill to extend unemployment benefits beyond six months from reaching the floor.

[G_j]

14. oh jeezz

----

The bill has been sharply pared back after weeks of negotiations with GOP moderates Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine. The most recent version, unveiled Wednesday night, contained new cuts to food stamps and pared back the state aid provision to allow Democrats to claim the measure was fully paid for except for the unemployment insurance extension.

That didn't move Republicans like Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.

"It adds new taxes and over $30 billion to an already staggering $13 trillion dollar national debt," said McConnell.

In February, McConnell had supported an earlier, bipartisan version of the bill that would have added more than $30 billion to the debt, according to a co-author of the measure, Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa.

[tkmorris]

16. See, that's the thing

I don't understand why we bother to negotiate with them anymore. All we do is water down legislation to the point of uselessness and gain nothing for it.

[Laelth]

21. Republicans can't kill squat. n/t

:dem:

-Laelth