By Marie Diamond/Think Progress
As the media fixates on the partisan battle over renewing the soon-to-expire payroll tax cut, the imminent threat of a government shutdown seems to have been lost in the mix. In addition to the payroll tax bill, Congress is far from finalizing an omnibus spending bill that will prevent the federal government from shutting down in three dayswhen its current round of funding runs out:
The increasingly contentious tax dispute threatens to derail what had been an emerging compromise on separate legislation to fund the government through next September, raising the specter of a possible government shutdown this weekend if the conflict is not resolved by Friday.
As they’ve repeatedly done before, the GOP is exploiting the imminent shutdown of the government to push its conservative agenda. On the Senate floor today, Majority Leader Sen. Reid (D-NV) listed many of the GOP demands — including rolling back environmental regulations — that are holding up a compromise on a bill to keep the government’s lights on. “I think that everyone can see very clearly that my friends on the other side of the aisle obviously want to have the government shut down,” Reid said. Watch it:
Reid asked for consent to move to a short-term continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government open while Congress finishes its work. But Minority Leader Sen. McConnell (R-KY) objected to a short-term CR, despite the looming shutdown. He also blocked the Senate from voting on the House GOP-passed payroll tax bill, despite saying yesterday that they should vote on the bill “without delay.”
A shutdown would affect 800,000 federal workers and halt many government services. This is the third time this year Republicans are using the threat of a government shutdown to get what they want. Indeed, the fact that these brinksmanship games have become so routine is probably part of the reason this imminent shutdown has been largely overlooked.
1 comment:
Seems the president doesn't believe his own words about the debt of the nation being a bad thing.
“The fact that we are here today to debate raising America 's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the US Government cannot pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government's reckless fiscal policies. Increasing America 's debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that, "the buck stops here.' Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.” ~ Senator Barack H. Obama, March 2006!
Post a Comment