I tried to get to the live feed of the BernieBuster, but it had crashed. In the meantime, Senators are larding up the Compromise Equals Capitulation Act with thick slabs of Christmas pork, pushing up the cost of the bill to $858 billion. Republicans are licking their chops and talking about how massive spending cuts will be needed to pay for all this. Even more absurd, it appears that this bill will actually be a tax increase for millions of workers, hitting the poorest hardest of all. Here’s an extensive analysis of the doings, but first, our new poll is on whether or not Obama should face a challenge in the 2012 primary. Check it out.
…On Friday, there were contrasting events for public consumption.
On Capitol Hill, Sanders spoke vigorously for 8 1/2 hours in a virtually empty chamber, urging defeat of a measure he said would give "tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires who don’t need it." He finally ended his speech, conceding "It has been a long day."
At the White House, Obama turned over the briefing room microphone to former President Clinton who declared, "I don’t believe there is a better deal out there." All sides, he said, "are going to have to eat some things they don’t like."
The add-ons were being attached behind the scenes.
Almost $5 billion in subsidies for corn-based ethanol and a continuing tariff to protect against ethanol imports were wrapped up and placed on the tree Thursday night for farm-state lawmakers and agribusiness lobbyists. Environmentalists won more grants for developers of renewable energy, like wind and solar.
For urban lawmakers, there’s a continuation of about-to-expire tax breaks that could save commuters who use mass transit about $1,000 a year. Other popular tax provisions aimed at increasing production of hybrid automobiles, biodiesel fuel, coal and energy-efficient household appliances would be extended through the end of 2011 under the new add-ons.
The package also includes an extension of two Gulf Coast tax incentive programs enacted after Hurricane Katrina to spur economic development in Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama.
The ethanol money was added despite a growing congressional opposition to subsidizing the fuel after decades of government support. Last month, 17 Republican and Democratic senators wrote to leaders calling the tax breaks "fiscally indefensible," since there’s already a law in place that requires ethanol be blended into gasoline.
"Historically the government has helped a product compete in one of three ways: Subsidize it, protect it from competition or require its use. We understand that ethanol may be the only product receiving all three forms of support from the U.S. government at this time," the senators wrote.
But ethanol still has powerful supporters on Capitol Hill, including Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley, the top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee and a key negotiator on the Senate tax bill. Adding the ethanol tax breaks was designed to help shore up the votes of many rural Democratic as well as Republican senators.
But while the add-ons may have won more votes for the Obama-GOP deal the Senate, their potential impact is less clear in the House, where Democrats have criticized the package as a tax giveaway to the rich… [emphasis added]
Inserted from <AP/Google>
I find the ethanol pork particularly offensive, because using farmland for fuel drives food costs up at a time when millions of Americans don’t have enough to eat. Furthermore, planting, fertilizing, growing, harvesting, transporting and refining the crop uses so much oil that the ethanol does little to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. The only green here is on the greenbacks! Watching Senators lard this bill, I want to throw up.
I have to admire Bernie. I could not have kept going the way he did.
The tax deal reached between President Obama and congressional Republicans could mean a higher tax bill for roughly one in three workers as a result of the Social Security tax cut Republicans pushed as a replacement for the current Making Work Pay tax credit.
The Making Work Pay credit gives workers up to $400, paid out at 8 percent of income, meaning that anybody making at least $5,000 gets the full amount — and gets as much as anybody else. Its replacement knocks two percentage points off the payroll tax cut, meaning a worker would need to make $20,000 to get a $400 break. Of the nation’s roughly 150 million workers, around 50 million make less than $20,000 and will see at least some increase as a result.
Additionally, roughly a quarter of 20 million state and local workers pay no payroll tax, because they have a separate pension system. Some of those workers with children will benefit from the extension of other tax credits, but overall will have less money in their pocket… [emphasis added]
Inserted from <Huffington Post>
There it is. If you’re poor, you get a tax increase to pay for tax cuts in the $hundreds of thousands for millionaires and billionaires!
Keith Olbermann with Rep. Jay Inslee and Rachel Maddow with Rep. Jan Schakowsky both had excellent takes on today’s doings. First Keith.
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Then Rachel.
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
When I went to see Obama speak in October, overcoming my disabilities to do so, I paid a high price in pain. But I thought it was worth it to see him rail against tax cuts for the rich, and promising not to give Republicans the keys to the car they have proven they can’t drive. He isn’t just giving them the keys. He’s trying to give them them the whole damn car! Has this earned him a primary challenge in 2012? Vote ib our new poll (top right) to answer.
8 Responses to “BernieBuster, Christmas Pork, and Tax Hikes”
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Personally I say no to the whole capitulation effort by this republican president and let the thugs do what they will come January. That may be harder on the poor, of which I am only 3k away from poverty level, but at least they will own it. Pass this POS and now all of the amendments and saccharine that is being added to it and it becomes a Democrat bill. It is a given no matter which way you turn that the wealthiest are going to benefit the most. Just like with the ethanol subsidy the largest farmers like Con Agra will benefit the most by that bacon wrapped on the hog belly.
People better begin to learn that their front door leads to the streets and they can either march on them or live on them that is the choice facing the American people who do not hold elected office.
Whatever they do that goes wrong is reported as Democratic anyway. I’ve seen more than one Foxtopian clip that 9/11 was Obama’s failure.
TC,
What concerns me most is the payroll tax “temporary” cut. While the idea itself would work as a stand alone kind of thing in different circumstances, as Arnold said to the alien creature in Predator – “Bad idea”.
Oso. I see anything touching Social Security as the first step on a slippery slope. Republicans will say, cut the benefits proportional to the contribution cut.
With all the talk the Republicans and Teabaggers did about reducing the debt, I can’t believe the would go for Obama’s tax surrender since it will increase the debt even more.
What Obama should do is get on National TV in front of Congress and tell them that they have two weeks to give him a dollar amount that he can submit a budget for and then he should submit a budget to Congress that doesn’t exceed that amount and see if Congress would actually pass it.
I doubt they would.
http://www.pafundi.com
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Number of Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom casualties as confirmed by U.S. Central Command: 5827
that’s just the aggressors. They had a choice.
Actual casualties number well over a million, those who had no choice in the matter.
Good point.
They actually want to keep increasing the debt in order to ‘starve the beast’.