So, it looks like that deal was short lived. Despite attempts to tie the payroll tax holiday extension and an extension of unemployment benefits to the year end spending bill, House Republicans have now changed their mind about the extensions now that the budget bill has passed.
And everyone pretends to be shocked.
The House GOP has determined that they are unhappy with the bill negotiated in senate that would allow a two month extension of the payroll tax and unemployment insurance, even though they will be getting a faster consideration of the Keystone Pipeline, a favorite pet project of the party. They are now asking for a chance to renegotiate the senate bill and reconcile a new version, despite the fact that the Senators have already left town for the holidays and the original passed the senate 89 to 10.
Although both Republicans and Democrats don’t seem entirely happy with the idea of a two month extension, the parties are against it for utterly different reasons. The Democrats, because they feel that two months is just a stopgap measure and that they will just have to fight for it again as soon as they return from break, and the Republicans because they don’t want any extension in the first place, saying the assistance it would provide average Americans isn’t worth the possibility of the country racking up more debt.
Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner has made it clear that there will be no passage of the senate bill as is. “It’s pretty clear that I and our Members oppose the Senate bill. How can you do tax policy for two months? We believe it’s time for the Senate to work with the House to complete our business for the year.” Boehner proposes that the senate should instead pass the House’s version of the bill, which would extend the payroll tax extension and unemployment benefits for a full year — a bill filled with with so many Republican poison pills it was written guaranteed to never become law.
The posturing makes it clear that the Senate Minority Leader MitchMcConnell was given the go ahead to allow Republicans to vote for the Senate version, knowing that the House would then try to kill the bill all together by demanding a compromise between the House and Senate version. That would provide the GOP with one last chance to say that it is Democrats refusing to compromise that makes the extension fail, despite the fact that Democrats compromised heavily just to get the Senate version passed.
Once more, the GOP proves that they want tax breaks, but only for the wealthy. If there is no agreement in the next two weeks, 160 million Americans will see what will amount to about a $1000 tax increase per year.
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By Jennifer Mueller
Under a 2007 energy law signed by President George W. Bush, the United States. was poised to cut energy use and climate pollution equivalent to 17 million cars by retiring the incandescent light bulb. Last week, Congress blocked those regulations from going into effect as planned next month by inserting language into the spending bill that averted a federal government shutdown on Friday.
While Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) referred to the rider as “another poke in the eye” and Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) credited the postponement of efficiency standards to “…the power of Michele Bachmann and the presidential campaign,” the rider only preserves the 100-watt incandescent temporarily, until October 2012.
According to The Wilderness Society, the irony of defending the 135-year-old incandescent technology is that light bulb manufacturers supported the new regulations. Consumers could have saved $15.8 billion in energy costs annually by full adoption of the new, more efficient, but still incandescent, bulbs the industry has introduced.
“In the real world, outside talk radio’s echo chamber, lighting manufacturers such as GE, Philips and Sylvania have tooled up to produce new incandescent light bulbs that look and operate exactly the same as old incandescent bulbs, and give off just as much warm light,” Republicans for Environmental Protection Policy Director Jim DiPeso told Politico. “The only difference is they produce less excess heat and are therefore 30 percent more efficient. Same light, lower energy bills. What’s not to like?”
Whatever the presidential campaign about the light bulb uprising out there, most American’s actually support efficiency standards, with 61% regarding them favorably according to a USA TODAY/Gallup poll. “Of those surveyed, 71%, said they have replaced standard light bulbs in their home with more efficient options, and 84% said they are “very satisfied” or “satisfied” with the alternatives,” the paper reported
Read more: http://www.care2.com/causes/congress-blocks-light-bulb-efficiency-standards-with-spending-bill.html#ixzz1h0aHJHfq
What are do these news items have in common?
1) The Republican fighting against the Middle and Working Class and the Environment.
2) The Caring members of Care 2 are also taking a stand.
3) Last and least, this humble blog is also taking a stand--This is why this Independent is Sounding very much like a Democrat, even though I reserve the right to still vote for the person, not for the party that they happen to belong to.
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