Tea-Publicans hold American tax cuts hostage to Canadian Keystone XL pipeline

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The framing for the 2012 election is "Whose side are you on?" it is clear that Tea-Publicans are on the side of multi-national corporations, not the American people.

The septegenarian Ninja Turtle, Mitch McConnell, says he will block the payroll tax holiday unless Democrats cave in to Tea-Publican demands to approve the Canadian Keystone XL pipeline (TransCanada Corporation), and the TanMan, Weeper of the House John Boehner, has agreed to hold the tax cuts to American workers hostage. Why do they hate America?

Steve Benen reports at the Political Animal – GOP leaders: Keystone XL or else:

 As of today, the ransom note has been winnowed, basically to a single condition.

Regarding that legislation, Don Stewart, a spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell emails me with the following statement: “The Leader will not support any bill without the Keystone XL language as part of the agreement.”

House Speaker John Boehner is also insisting that he’ll amend any Senate-passed payroll tax cut bill to add the Keystone provision to it, if it’s not already in there. So Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and President Obama now have a choice: stick to their guns and object to the provision — at the risk of allowing the payroll tax cut (and unemployment insurance and the Medicare “doc fix”) to expire? Or give in to the GOP. 

Are Republican leaders seriously taking the position that taxes should go up for 160 million Americans unless they get the Keystone XL pipeline? Yes, that’s pretty much the GOP position.

Note, as of a few days ago, both parties were pushing for measures in the payroll fight the other party found objectionable — Democrats wanted a surtax on millionaires and billionaires; Republicans wanted Keystone. Democrats, hoping to reach a deal, effectively said yesterday, “We’re willing to drop our demand.” To which Republicans responded, “Give us what we want or else.”

There appears to be a difference in the way the parties negotiate.

Well, yes. "Good faith" is not in the Tea-Publican's vocabularly. They practice the tried and true "What's mine is mine, and what's yours is negotiable." This is the essence of totalitarianism and tyranny.

Most GOP lawmakers don’t support the idea of a middle-class payroll tax break and extending unemployment insurance benefits anyway. This does not benefit the one percent.

There’s also the inconvenient details as to how the pipeline decision would be made. The Republican demand isn’t exactly that the project get a green light, but rather, that the decision be expedited. The issue is in the hands of the State Department, which has warned Congress that forcing the issue may very well kill the entire initiative. Indeed, Reuters reported last week that a deadline imposed by Congress could “effectively rule out a permit for the project.”

Republicans don’t seem to care, and seem to think they can get their way with the administration. If Democrats cave on this point in the payroll tax fight, the Keystone XL pipeline project may die anyway. So is it really about the pipeline? Or is this just a "poison pill" to kill middle-class tax cuts after Democrats already caved on the "millionaire's surtax"? Tea-Publicans: the party of the one percent. Everyone else can go to hell.

For those of you who will ask, "What about the jobs?" Steve Benen explains:

The standard Republican/Fox News talking point is that the Keystone XL project would create 20,000 jobs. Nonpartisan estimates suggest that figure is wildly inflated, and one independent report concluded that “the project could actually destroy more jobs than it creates.”

Short answer: no one really knows for sure, despite what they may tell you.