{"id":714,"date":"2010-03-02T00:52:14","date_gmt":"2010-03-02T08:52:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=714"},"modified":"2010-03-02T00:52:14","modified_gmt":"2010-03-02T08:52:14","slug":"gop-hide-behind-bunning-to-sow-more-havoc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2010\/03\/02\/gop-hide-behind-bunning-to-sow-more-havoc\/","title":{"rendered":"GOP Hide Behind Bunning to Sow More Havoc"},"content":{"rendered":"

On the 27th of last month, I<\/font> proclaimed<\/a> Jim Bunning a GOP sweetheart.  The GOP continues to use him to sow havoc in the most despicable way!<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\"GOPgreedy\"<\/a> Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) is already infamous for blocking a temporary extension of unemployment and COBRA benefits for out of work Americans. But included in that package is legislation to prevent a mandatory pay cut for doctors–and by standing in its way, he’s triggered a 21 percent fee reduction to doctors seeing Medicare patients starting today<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Republicans say they support a temporary measure to avoid the cuts, but they have been unable [unwilling] to rein in Bunning, and, as such, the Senate has failed to act on a House bill that staves them off.<\/p>\n

The American Medical Association warned of this last week<\/a>: "A Medicare meltdown now seems certain, as the U.S. Senate has left early for the weekend, abandoning seniors, military families and baby boomers," reads an AMA statement from Friday. "The Senate failed to repeal the Medicare physician payment formula that will cause a drastic 21 percent payment cut to physicians who care for Medicare and TRICARE patients. On Monday, the 21 percent cut goes into effect, forcing many physicians to limit the number of Medicare and TRICARE patients they see in order to keep their practice doors open<\/strong>."<\/p>\n

On a conference call with reporters this afternoon Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) put it this way: "By his actions, Bunning has prevented people from receiving Unemployment, health care access, transportation projects from going forward, and Doctors who provide Medicare services from getting paid<\/strong>."<\/p>\n

Today, for the seventh time, Bunning objected to a request for unanimous consent to temporarily extend benefits. In addition to cutting doctor’s fees, his exploitation of the Senate’s filibuster rules has cost thousands of out-of-work Americans their benefits and has even put thousands of federal employees out of work<\/strong>. <\/p>\n

Democrats hope to resolve the issues in a longer-term way by passing jobs bill (which includes benefits extensions and a so-called "doc-fix" for Medicare reimbursement rates) next week. In the mean time they’re bracing for Bunning and the GOP to take as many steps as possible to delay legislative progress\u2026 [emphasis added<\/em>]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Inserted from <TPM<\/a>><\/p>\n

Lawrence O\u2019Donnell and Chris Hayes discussed the ripple effects.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/embed><\/object><\/font><\/p>\n

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news<\/a>, world news<\/a>, and news about the economy<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The GOP strategy here is to create public dissatisfaction in the hope that they can blame Democrats for their perfidy.  Rachel Maddow covers who this hurts and ties it in with GOP obstruction.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/embed><\/object><\/font><\/p>\n

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news<\/a>, world news<\/a>, and news about the economy<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Personally I think that Bunning is getting tired of his roll as target to cover for the GOP leaders orchestrating this outrage.  He\u2019s clearly getting quite testy!<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\"bunning\"<\/a> Since last week, Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) has been obstructing legislation to extend unemployment benefits, telling Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) \u201ctough sh*t<\/a>\u201d when Merkley pleaded with Bunning to drop the hold on the Senate floor. Bunning blocked the measure because of \u201ca dispute<\/a> over how [the bill] should be funded,\u201d leaving 400,000 Americans in limbo after the benefits expired at midnight on Sunday<\/a>. Today, an \u201cangry\u201d Bunning refused to answer questions about his hold, running away<\/a> from an ABC reporter and taking refuge in a senator\u2019s only elevator. Shouting \u201cExcuse me!,\u201d Bunning would not say whether he was concerned about people losing their benefits…<\/p>\n

…Off camera, when ABC producer Z. Byron Wolf tried to engage Bunning, he said, \u201cI\u2019m not talking to anybody<\/a>\u201d and gave Wolf the middle finger<\/a>\u2026<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Inserted from <Think Progress<\/a>><\/p>\n

In a Politics Plus exclusive, Bunning was photographed in the act of giving the finger, as seen above. \ud83d\ude09<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the 27th of last month, I proclaimed Jim Bunning a GOP sweetheart.  The GOP continues to use him to sow havoc in the most despicable way! Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) is already infamous for blocking a temporary extension of unemployment and COBRA benefits for out of work Americans. But included in that package is legislation […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=714"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}