
So I’m sure you’ve heard by now. The House of Representatives passed the bill that will extend the Bush tax cuts, renew unemployment benefits for 13 months, and cut Social Security taxes for one year late last night. The roll call showed it was a total landslide at 277-148. Democrats had 139 yeas and 112 nays while the Republicans has 138-36
Go here to see the roll call and find out how they voted.
The Democrats tried to pass a higher estate tax but that went down in flames also at 277-148. Good news.
Even better news? Harry Reid was forced to shelve the monstrosity called The Omnibus Bill that had over a trillion dollars in earmarks in it:
Congress Weighs Short-Term Budget Fix to Avert Government Shutdown:
The government is careening toward a temporary shutdown at 12:01 a.m. Sunday unless President Obama signs a spending bill into law.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said the lower chamber will vote on a spending bill Friday afternoon to keep the government open through Tuesday.
House leadership sources told Fox News they could and should vote on a temporary spending bill that would keep the government afloat until February in part because 63 defeated Democrats have no offices and no place to go. They would like to go home, the sources said.
Dave Weigel on the successful attack of the Omnibus Bill by the American people:
This bill is so enormous it took the Government Printing Office two days to print it. It spends more than half a billion dollars a page. It runs just under 2,000 pages. And it’s got more than a billion dollars in it for the Democrat health care bill that an ever-growing number of Americans want to repeal, not fund. This is exactly the kind of thing the American people voted against in November. It’s unbelievable, really. Just a few weeks after the voters told us they don’t want us rushing major pieces of complicated, costly, far-reaching legislation through Congress, we get this.
And one month after McConnell found religion on earmarks in general, and supported the moratorium championed by DeMint, McConnell found religion on his earmarks, and supported the antidote to them favored by Jim DeMint.
My first take on the omnibus bill, and on these Republican stumbles that happened because of the bill, didn’t really explain what would happen if the bill was withdrawn. That was because omnibus bills aren’t withdrawn like this, just like appropriations bills aren’t usually stymied and fumbled for the entirety of legislative sessions. It was also because, until yesterday, there was some advantage for Republicans getting money sent back to their districts. Every House Republican voted against the stimulus bill, for example, but plenty of Republicans participated in ribbon-cutting ceremonies or factory walk-arounds in places that got stimulus cash.
We should have see this coming, though. The increasing transparency of the earmark process was going to make it tougher for Republicans to support this bill and get away with it. There is nothing — literally, nothing — that currently motivates most Republicans to send money back home. Look at what’s happened with the Appropriations Committee in the House. It was big news that Hal Rogers, a proud earmarker in the past, scored the chairmanship over non-earmarker Jack Kingston. The under-the-radar news was that Republicans were having a hell of a time filling out the rest of the committee.
~~~It’s extremely important that earmarking has become a more transparent process, and that it’s now easy to call out members for their requests before bills are voted on. Look at the context, though. Earmarks are only the easiest way to nail members for doing what has never really been controversial — appropriating. Republican voters, and a considerable number of independents, don’t want their representatives to shuffle around money anymore. The aggressive centralized government of 2009, pumping money into states and districts, is gone, and there’s no political will to recreate it.
If a two-month continuing resolution passes, as Republicans now want, it would fall to the new Republican House to create a budget very soon. That means the new Budget chairman, Paul Ryan, will get the opportunity to start cutting back the budget along the lines of the roadmap he’s been talking about since 2009. And there’s no question anymore as to whether Republicans will have the determination to make cuts, or whether transparency and exposure will keep them honest about this.
This was caused by you and I fighting against the normal operating procedure of our elected representatives. We forced transparency in the earmark process and that transparency was the ONLY reason this thing died. And now the new Congress will get to send a bill to the President that correctly reflects what the American people want.
Give yourselves a round of applause.

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The Omnibus Bill was basically a Blank Check. It is good that more prudent Members of the Parliament of Whores shot it down. 2012 is coming. Voters know who held the line and who sold them out. The Sword of the Ballot hangs over some heads in DC now. Last Falls Elections are just a glimpse of what is to come and Members of Both Parties need to get the message. The irresponsible spending MUST stop. The Programs that serve no beneficial purpose to the Majority of Americans must be cut off or cut back.
The Party of “WE Won” is on the way to the woodshed, Thank God, and they All need to listen up. No more croquet mallet gavels, no more waste, fraud & abuse of Taxpayer Funds. It has to cease NOW and a return to Fiscal Responsibility is Mandated, not Voluntary but justified by Necessity must happen.
Anyone betting as to whether the new GOP majority will try to pare this disgusting bill back?
BWAH HA HA HA HA HA!
I would like the new majority to send a series of spending bills that added together will be the budget. The heck with an overall bill used to sneak spending past the veto along with congressional review.
Give Obama fits when he signs all the various bills but needs to lobby congress for additional spending for his Czars to get paid.
There’s definitely a dividing line forming between the two schools of Republicans (all Democrats are pro-pork).
The John McCain School.
McCain never larded up even one bill in his entire career.
But he has voted for pork-laden bills to get other things into law.
The Ron Paul School.
Ron Paul lards up bills all up one side and down the other.
Then, when the bill is safely going to pass he safely votes against it.
Between 2008 and 2010 the Ron Paul School was winning, but…..
This time the john McCain School won.
I wonder which school the newly-elected Republicans will be?
I wonder what folks in this country really want?
I see a lot of STUPID Prius cars on the road that will never pay for themselves but make the owners feel good.
So, naturally, I’m concerned.
Finally, Reid is run over by his own omnibus. Hopefully, the pork stops here.
Nan G; Every time I see a Prius on the road I want to scream out: “That’s 2.2 pounds of rare earth minerals under your hood, jerk. Why don’t you just shove a rainforest, a polar bear and a baby seal up your tank and be done with it, hypocrite?”
I for one an quite heartened at the way things are going and the new Representatives and Senators haven’t even been seated yet. It can only get better from here. Sure I would have liked to not extend the jobless benefits and kill the death tax but to force the dems to remove the omnibus is priceless. A good first step.
@ Nan G, #5:
I see people tooling around town in their soon-to-be-extinct Hummer SUVs, which aren’t very likely to pay for themselves either. Maybe driving a chromium-trimmed, 9 mpg tank to the grocery store makes them feel good.
I think I can guess who will feel the best the next time gasoline prices spike. Particularly if the prices don’t come back down again.
Greg, leave it to you to miss the difference between consumption via an SUV (which can legally transport a family with more than two children) VERSUS the ”hey-look-at-me,” type of idiocy that is the purview of those who turn out all the lights during ”Earth Hour” buy Prius, or do any number of bogus, so-called ”green” acts of feel-good’ism.
LOL!
Toothfairy @#6: Excellent!
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-december-16-2010/9-11-first-responders-react-to-the-senate-filibuster
Word on the street is that Nancy took her ball and went home, didn’t vote, didn’t show up at the signing. Looser or really sore looser.
Just Another Lie…
5 days
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgaMdzMqLgI&feature=player_embedded
Call it anything else and You are a Liar as well.
Why didn’t Obama say, “It’s Bush’s fault” on this issue too? Maybe it’s because he would have to admit that Bush still has a lot of power even though he ain’t president any more.
@Carl: #4
There should be a rule change so that bills are voted on in the order they are submitted. This would keep the leaders from holding back bills they don’t want approved. There should also be a rule change that says a bill can’t have any changes unless it has to do with the actual bill.
@Greg: #8
A conservative radio talk show host said that the nickel for the Prius comes from Canada, is shipped to England, made into batteries, shipped to Japan, put in the cars, shipped to the USA, and it takes more energy to make the Prius than the Hummer. Keep in mind that the original Hummer isn’t made for civilians any more. The Hummers you buy now are on pickup frames.
I’ll keep my Toyota Camry 4-cylinder and keep getting close to 40mpg on the open highway.
@Old Trooper 2: #12
1924 pages in the bill,
5 days to read it,
384.8 pages per day,
24 hours in a day,
16 pages per hour,
60 minutes in one hour,
0.27 pages per minute, or one page every 4 minutes of 24 hour a day reading for 5 days.
Anyone go along with a bill that says the time allowed to read a bill will depend on its size? The longer the bill, the longer the time to read it. It should be based on a per page basis. This would end the long winded bills with complicated language to make it hard and boring to read.
Smorgasbord
When obama signs the bill the Dumbocraps can no longer cry “Bush tax cuts for the rich.” The bill will be known as the obama tax cuts for the rich.
@Manchego: #17
Thanks for clearing that up. Just think how that is sticking in his craw.
Then like a Bad Dream…
Dead Man Gouges Taxpayers
Bay State pols U.S. Sen. John Kerry and U.S. Rep. Edward Markey had sought another $30 million this year, only to see it get slashed down to $8.5 mil- lion as an anti-earmark tide swept over Capitol Hill
http://curmudgeonlyskeptical.blogspot.com/2010/12/ted-still-gouging-taxpayers.html
😛
Smorgasbord
One of my favorite episodes
@Manchego: #20
Off topic, but Maxwell Smart has always been my hero. I try to be just like him. My #2 hero is The Pink Panther (the cartoon and the human)
@Cary #10:
But no – it’s just the GOP’s fault. The hack named Jon Stewart conveniently neglects to mention that Obama hasn’t even pushed for the First Responders bill.
In ’03 Pelosi whined about the GOP not funding it. Hmmm, when they got control of both houses of Congress, where was the bill then? Oh I know some money was thrown into an omnibus bill here or there, but if they had wanted to take care of the first responders, they could have.
Look, I am the first to say that we need to take care of these brave heroes; but since Obama, Pelosi and Reid went on their multi-trillion dollar spending spree, every bill now suffers from NO MONEY-itis.
If I was the GOP I wouldn’t be rushing to pat myself on the back for this bill, especially the way expectations and MSM has framed the message and intent behind the bill.
One really has to wonder at the “intelligence”, or lack of it, by members of congress railing against the extension of the Bush tax cuts, by claiming that we don’t have the money to “pay for it”, yet when it comes down to it, voted for it by cramming in all kinds of extra spending.
Congresscritter1 – “We don’t have the money to pay for the tax cuts for everyone”
Congresscritter2 – “Well, would you vote for it if I include millions/billions for your district/state”
Congresscritter1 – “Of course I will”
Stupid is as stupid does. Why do we, as a country, listen to any of the tripe rolling out of DC?
JOHNGALT; WHY DO WE LET IT HAPPEN, ARE THE AMERICANS hostages of the GOVERNMENT,
ELECTED TO SERVE THE PEOPLE?
@ anticsrocks, #22:
As I understand it, the cost of providing medical care to 9/11 first responders will be largely paid for by imposing a 2% excise fee on foreign companies that land U.S. government contracts, and by charging visa fees to U.S. companies which fill more than 50% of their employee positions with foreign workers on H-1B and L-1 visas.
This all sounds fine to me. It takes care of some neglected heros that we have a moral duty to help, while simultaneously discouraging the preferential hiring of foreign workers.