Jim Bunning Cock Blocking Your Unemployment Extension

The whole system is truly messed up. If you're unemployed, you should be able to collect your full insurance for a significant period of time, even if you find a job during that period that pays you any amount. The idea is to help people get on and stay on their feet, not put them on a tight rope and give them a flimsy net in case they fall. If you can get benefits for 6 months while working for 4, you can build up a nice nest egg to help yourself through toughish times or maybe start a small business or something. It will cost us less in the long run to see people stay gainfully employed than to keep extending benefits to them that discourage them from working.

 

The system is messed up, but until something better takes its place one asshole in the Senate shouldn't deprive families from the benefits of the current system. DOT just laid off 2000 more workers today. There's a brand new batch of Americans who will now apply for unemployment. There's also a domino effect from it because these families will cut back on consumption from their local grocery store, shopping mall etc. Brilliant.

 

He's a real 'Maverick'

 

Until today, it hardly seemed possible that Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Ky., could be more widely despised than he was, but he has succeeded in diminishing his already low stature. Loutish, eccentric and mean, he says that his filibuster against extended unemployment insurance benefits is spurred by his concern over the federal deficit. The jobless and their children may depend on that assistance for rent and food, but Bunning insists that the Obama adminisration use stimulus funding to pay for unemployment extensions. He doesn’t give a damn that on Sunday benefits will run out for hundreds of thousands of struggling families.

While even Bunning’s fellow Republicans dislike him intensely, none of them cares enough about the unemployed to tell him to sit down and shut up. That has been left to the Democrats, who should make Bunning the poster boy of the right-wing filibuster — a symbol of obstructed democracy and discarded humanity.

Here’s a suggestion for anyone who runs into the former baseball pitcher on the Senate floor. Tell him that if he is truly worried about the deficit, he should stop using the Jim Bunning Foundation to shelter the money he makes from baseball memorabilia.

Ever since he was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame, Bunning has operated this phony “charitable” operation as a front for his business selling autographed balls. As this outfit’s sole employee, working one hour a week, he has paid himself hundreds of thousands of dollars over the past 10 years — considerably more than the amount donated to any actual charity.

Indeed, the only charities to which the foundation gives any significant sums are Catholic churches attended by Bunning and his family (so he gets other people to make his religious donations as well). Perhaps those churches ought to reconsider accepting his generosity in light of his nasty conduct toward the unemployed, whose plight is a matter of grave concern to the Catholic hierarchy.

Clearly Bunning is a man of low character, even for someone who belongs to what Twain described as “our only distinctly native American criminal class.” Not only does he exploit a charitable foundation to avoid taxes and ethics rules while greasing his own palm; he actually put a Washington lobbyist on the foundation board — and then arranged budget earmarks for clients of that same lobbyist, who oversees his self-dealing scam. Someone ought to file an ethics complaint against this dreadful, dishonest man.

http://www.salon.com/news/jim_bunning/index.html?story=/opinion/conason/2010/02/26/bunning

 

http://congress.blogs.foxnews.com/2010/03/02/bunning-drops-filibuster/

Bunning Drops Filibuster

Democrats have reached a deal with Sen. Jim Bunning, R-KY, who has been holding up a bill for days that temporarily extends unemployment insurance and COBRA benefits -- while he insisted that the $10 billion measure be paid for.

Bunning will now get a vote on an amendment that pays for the measure out of unallocated stimulus funds. This is, ironically, what Dems offered Bunning days ago, but Bunning was insistent that all 100 senators accept his amendment -- an unusual move.

But Democrats and late night talk show hosts have pummeled Bunning, and not many of his Republican colleagues have come to his aid.
Under the deal, Bunning will get 2 more votes on amendments to a longer term benefits bill. One would pay for an extension with an across-the-board cut in discretionary spending. The other is to take money from so-called "black liquor" -- keeping it from being eligible for the cellulose biofuels producer tax credit. Bunning said that "would save the Treasury $24 billion."

At 8:30pm, the Senate will vote on Bunning's stimulus amendment -- then on final passage of the temporary extension. It is clear the final passage vote will be overwhelmingly in favor of the bill.

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-IL, the chamber's #2 Dem, has led the charge against Bunning. He argued tonight that members should not support Bunning's move, primarily because, "It is unfortunately a way to delay even further" the benefits, as the House would have to take time to pass this Senate bill (it does not match anything the House would have passed -- so any changes would mean the bill goes back to the House for approval before heading to President Obama for his signature.)

Bunning chided Dems for not supporting "pay as you go" rules recently approved that mandate that any new spending be paid for with offsets (they are referred to as "pay-fors") in the budget, decrying the burdensome, mounting national debt. Dems chided Bunning for not supporting the PAYGO bill and said this is an emergency -- therefore, the bill should not be paid for.

Bunning, in a statement, said of tonight's vote on his amendment, "I hope Senate Democrats tonight vote for their own pay-fors and show Americans that they are committed to fiscal discipline. I will be watching them closely and checking off the hypocrites one by one."

So -- the drama is over....for now (I think).

 

http://www.businessweek.com/news/20...-pass-plan-to-reinstate-jobless-benefits.html

U.S. Senate Likely to Pass Plan to Reinstate Jobless Benefits
March 02, 2010, 9:10 AM EST

March 2 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Senate Democrats are likely to pass by next week a bill to reinstate unemployment benefits that expired Feb. 28, said Regan Lachapelle, a spokeswoman for Majority Leader Harry Reid.

Jobless benefits for thousands of Americans expired after Senator Jim Bunning, a Kentucky Republican, blocked a one-month continuation designed to keep checks from being interrupted.

The provisions are part of a $150 billion measure intended to boost the economy. The legislation would spend $81 billion to extend the unemployment benefits, including so-called Cobra subsidies to help the jobless buy health insurance, for the rest of this year. It also would send $25 billion to state governments to help prevent layoffs.

In blocking the legislation, Bunning complained that the $10 billion cost would be tacked onto the $1.6 trillion budget deficit.

(my note: $150B bill is not the $10B bill Bunning blocked)

 

Glad he's done grand standing.