Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
There are two measures Congress must deal with in short order: extension of unemployment benefits and the Obama middle class tax cuts. But Republicans stand in opposition to Congress doing anything unless they get the Bush tax cuts for the "two percenters" extended – at a cost of $700 billion in additional defict spending over the next ten years. The GOP is holding America hostage for tax cuts for the über-rich.
Congress has just 15 days until the current authorization for unemployment insurance expires, potentially taking with it happy holidays not just for the people relying on the benefits, but for the nation's retailers who rely on the holiday shopping season for as much as 20% of their revenues for the year. Daily Kos: Poll finds continuing unemployment insurance trumps deficit concerns:
With that in mind, a a new poll by Hart Research Associates [pdf] commissioned by the National Employment Law Project (NELP) finds that nearly 75 percent of Americans say that it is too early to cut off jobless benefits, and they reject the idea that benefits should be cut because of deficit concerns.
Altogether, 9 million hard-working-Americans-if-they-could-find-work receive unemployment benefits. Four million of those have "only" been out of work for 26 or fewer weeks, and they collect regular benefits. But more than 5 million receive their benefits under the Emergency Unemployment Compensation Act. Without prompt action by Congress, 2 million of the latter group will stop receiving compensation paychecks before Christmas. In the first months of 2011, another 3 million will face the same predicament. Groups push jobless benefits extension.
Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), the incoming chairman of the House Budget Committee, doesn't like the idea of holding a separate vote on permanently extending middle-income tax cuts, an approach that he calls "decoupling." Instead, Ryan wants to hold middle-income tax cuts hostage to give Republicans the leverage they need to pass upper-income tax cuts. Paul Ryan: GOP opposes 'decoupling' tax cuts:
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka says Democrats are actively considering holding a vote on middle-income tax cuts without extending upper-income tax cuts.
[Greg Sargent on Friday reported here that liberal groups and labor have hit on a legislative strategy to make the fight over the Bush tax cuts work in Dems' favor: Hold a vote just on making the middle class tax cuts permanent, without tying it to any vote on the high end ones. Dem Reps. Raul Grijalva and Lynn Woolsey, the two co-chairs of the House Progressive Caucus, have endorsed this approach, sending a letter to Nancy Pelosi asking her to carry it out.]
As Ryan concedes, if Democrats want to follow that path, there's nothing Republicans can do — Dems control the levers of power and can pretty much do whatever they want during the lame duck session.
And now, perhaps fearing that Dems will recognize the power they have, Republicans are threatening to hold another group hostage: two million Americans who need to receive unemployment insurance benefits. Unless the upper-income tax cuts are extended, the GOP says, they'll oppose aid for Americans who need it most.
As Joan McCarter writes at Daily Kos: GOP lawmaker holding 2 million unemployed hostage on behalf of richest 2%, "If this isn't class warfare, I don't know what is."
[Rep. Pete Sessions, a Republican in House leadership] said he could back extending jobless benefits, favored by Democrats like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in exchange for an extension of all Bush-era tax cuts, including for the wealthiest groups.
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In other words, give the rich a tax break, or the two million people who will lose their benefits by the end of December are out on the street. Oh, and happy holidays.
The über-rich "two percenters" have declared war on the other 98% of us. They want to shake us down for our very last dime until they have it all. The American people should rise up in unison and tell the "two percenters" and their Republican servants in Congress "fuck you!" Your economic policies over the past 30 years have destroyed the American middle class and redistributed our wealth upwards to the über-rich "two percenters" — it's over. We're taking it back!"
If you want to limit the power of government, feel free to advocate for that. Limit the size and scope of government and thousands of lobbyists will go back to their original jobs. Too many lobbyists is a symptom of too much government.
Shrink government power and all George Soros or the Koch brothers have is millions of dollars with which they can buy all the ads they want. I have the power of the off switch. I need not watch one more second of any 2%er than I choose to.
Advocacy of government as the solution is the modern day Trojan horse. Once the government has the power then We the People no longer have the power to solve the problem ourselves.
I have no fear of the freedom given to Citizens United and similar organizations after the US Supreme Court ruled in their favor. The fact that it may (just may) have helped Republicans is no worry of mine. Again, nobody can force me to listen to their words, ideas or documentaries. There is a near infinite amount of speech that can be earned to counter Citizens United.
The results of government as a solution (whether behind closed doors or not) are what make most people (including myself) say “No sale” if not bamboozled by its salesmen.
In closing let me suggest that you write an article about the biggest closed door government monopoly of them all – The Federal Reserve. FYI – Senator Jon Kyl doesn’t support an audit of the Federal Reserve (S. 604) and friend of “the people” Senator Bernie Sanders does.
Your simplistic ignorance renders your opinions of no value to anyone but yourself, which I suspect is all that you really care about. The two percenters spend billions of dollars on lobbyists every year, and billions of dollars more to corrupt our political system (Citizens United) and to buy congressmen to write the rules in their favor. The tax code favors redistribution of wealth from the middle class to the rich because they paid for it. The two percenters manipulate government, not the other way around.
You obviously have never been involved in government and witnessed how the real world works behind closed doors. Your airy-fairy libertarian utopian theories are all just bullshit in the real world.
The richest 2% isn’t “taking” one dollar from anybody. They can’t, they are not the government.
In keeping with the vastly more polite manners of the American population they have apparently said “No, thank you” to a great many health-care reformin’, stimulus-lovin’ elected officials.
Rather than engage in futile could’a/should’a/would’a I’ll just say that it will be interesting to see who the voters say “No, thank you” to come 2012.