Lots of successes coming out of the lame duck session in spite of all the venting and windbaggery being practiced by the indivudal players. If we could get two lame duck sessions a year it would be enough to govern the country.
As President Obama signed into law Friday the massive bipartisan tax package the debate over its implications raged on. Obama found himself surrounded by Democrats and Republicans eager to take advantage of a photo opportunity that illustrates their effort to prevent a big New Year's Day tax hike for millions of Americans.
Obama called the deal "real money that's going to make a real difference in people's lives." But others continue to criticize the deal. Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., said Obama and lawmakers will face enormous election-year pressure in 2012 to extend the cuts again or make them permanent. Weiner said the Republicans turned out to be "better poker players" than Obama.
The White House continued to defend the deal on Friday, saying there was no viable alternative plan. "There was a lot of heat generated around this, but I will point out that a majority of Democrats in the House supported," White House chief spokesman Robert Gibbs said. Incoming House Speaker John Boehner hailed the deal but said there's room for improvement. "It's a good first step, but let's be clear," he said. "If we actually want to help our economy get back on track and to begin creating jobs, we need to end the job-killing spending binge. We need to cut spending significantly, and we need to provide more certainty to small businesses around America."
The measure would extend existing tax cuts for families at every income level, renew jobless benefits for the long-term unemployed and enact a new one-year cut in Social Security taxes that would benefit nearly every worker who earns a wage.
The bill was passed just before midnight Thursday in a remarkable show of bipartisanship in the House, despite objections from some Democrats, who wanted to impose a higher estate tax than the one Obama agreed to. The vote was 277-148, with each party contributing an almost identical number of votes in favor -- the Democrats 139 and the Republicans 138.
In a rare reach across party lines, Obama negotiated the $858 billion package with Senate Republicans. The White House then spent the past 10 days persuading congressional Democrats to go along, providing a possible blueprint for the next two years, when Republicans will control the House and hold more seats in the Senate.
"There probably is nobody on this floor who likes this bill," said House Majority Leader Steny D-Md. "The judgment is, is it better than doing nothing? Some of the business groups believe it will help. I hope they're right."
Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich., said that with unemployment hovering just under 10 percent and the deadline for avoiding a big tax hike fast approaching, lawmakers had little choice but to support the bill. "This is just no time to be playing games with our economy," said Camp, who will become chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee in January. "The failure to block these tax increases would be a direct hit to families and small businesses."
Sweeping tax cuts enacted when George W. Bush was president are scheduled to expire Jan. 1 -- a little more than two weeks away. The bill extends them for two years, placing the issue squarely in the middle of the next presidential election, in 2012.
The extended tax cuts include lower rates for the rich, the middle class and the working poor, a $1,000-per-child tax credit, tax breaks for college students and lower taxes on capital gains and dividends. The bill also extends through 2011, a series of business tax breaks designed to encourage investment that expired at the end of 2009.
Workers' Social Security taxes would be cut by nearly a third, going from 6.2 percent to 4.2 percent, for 2011. A worker making $50,000 in wages would save $1,000; one making $100,000 would save $2,000.
"This legislation is good for growth, good for jobs, good for working and middle class families, and good for businesses looking to invest and expand their work force," said Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.
Some Democrats complained that the package is too generous to the wealthy; Republicans complained that it doesn't make all the tax cuts permanent. Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite, R-Fla., called it "a bipartisan moment of clarity."
The bill's cost, $858 billion, would be added to the deficit, a sore spot among budget hawks in both parties.
"I know that we are going to borrow every nickel in this bill," Hoyer lamented.
At the insistence of Republicans, the plan includes an estate tax that would allow the first $10 million of a couple's estate to pass to heirs without taxation. The balance would be subject to a 35 percent tax rate.
Many House Democrats wanted a higher estate tax, one that would allow couples to pass only $7 million tax-free, taxing anything above that amount at a 45 percent rate. They argued that the higher estate tax would affect only 6,600 of the wealthiest estates in 2011 and would save $23 billion over two years.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., called the estate tax the "most egregious provision" in the bill and held a vote that would have imposed the higher estate tax. It failed, 194-233.
Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., said he thought the White House could have gotten a better deal. "When I talk to the Republicans they are giddy about this bill," he said.
So the Democrats talked trash, strutted and cooed and generally acted like peacocks about to mate and then as predicted approved the presidents deal. As we at ACVDN declared earlier in a Dec 7th article President Obama Did The Right Thing and everybody is better off for it. Looking at the things that got done in the lame duck session I've got to say it was quite a success.
Don't Ask, Don't Tell Ends
After months of fits and starts, a bill repealing "don't ask, don't tell," the ban against gays serving openly in the military, passed the Senate 65 to 31 on Saturday.
Eight Republicans -- Sens. Scott Brown of Massachusetts, Susan Collins and Olympia J. Snowe of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mark Kirk of Illinois, John Ensign of Nevada, Richard Burr of North Carolina, and George Voinovich of Ohio -- joined 57 members of the Democratic caucus in support of the historic measure. Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) did not vote Saturday, but released a statement saying he could not support repeal "at this time." So sorry Joe but it was now or never and you missed it, Robert Byrd had courage - you don't.
Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), the lead Senate sponsor of the bill, framed the issue as a civil rights imperative, calling the ban on gays in the military "inconsistent with basic American values."
"To force the 'don't ask, don't tell' policy on the military is to force them to be less than they want to be -- and less than they can be," Lieberman said Saturday. "These people simply want to serve their country." Under the Clinton-era policy, armed services members are expected to keep their sexual orientation private, with the promise that recruiters and officers will not delve into their personal lives.
President Obama applauded the Senate and said "thousands of patriotic Americans" would no longer have to "live a lie" to serve in the military.
During the debate Saturday, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said he was alarmed by the number of Arabic and Farsi linguists who had been discharged under the policy at a time the military needs them most, noting that nearly 10,000 of the 14,000 men and women forced out since 1993 were language specialists.
"I don't care who you love. If you love this country enough to risk your life for it, you should be able to serve as you are," Wyden said. "Today the Senate has the opportunity to be on the right side of history. 'Don't ask, don't tell' is a wrong that should never have been perpetrated."
At a congressional hearing earlier this month, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Joint Chiefs Chairman Mike Mullen testified that lifting the DADT policy would likely have only a limited impact on the services. They said they preferred congressional action -- which would give the military some time to implement the change -- to a judicial decision, which would alter the policy immediately.
Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the Senate Armed Service Committee, cited that testimony, as well as the results of a Pentagon study on implementing the change, as the reasons he believed ending the policy that bans gays from serving openly is the right thing to do.
"The final report of a working group concluded that changing the policy would present a low risk to the military's effectiveness, even during a time of war, and that 70 percent believe it would be positive, mixed or no effect," Levin said. "The troops told us that what matters is doing the job."
But several Republicans on the Armed Services panel disagreed with Levin and stood up Saturday to vocally oppose changing the policy.
Sen. John McCain, a former Navy flier and POW during the Vietnam war, had filibustered the repeal bill throughout the year. Yet he said he was resigned to the fact that it would pass an earlier test vote Saturday. But McCain (R-Ariz.) said he remained convinced that repealing the ban would cost American lives.
"I understand the other side's argument about their social political agenda, but to somehow argue that ['don't ask, don't tell'] has harmed our military is not consistent with the facts," he said. Although McCain said he was confident that the military will comply with a change in the law, he warned that troops will
be put at greater risk as a result. "They will do what is asked of them, but don't think it won't be at great cost," he said.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a JAG officer in the Air Force Reserves, excoriated the bill's proponents for pushing forward with the change when the military is fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. "You care more about politics...than you care about governing this country," Graham said.
Now that the bill has passed the House and Senate, it goes to Obama to be signed into law some time next week.
But a change in the law will not automatically change the policy. Rather, the bill stipulates that the policy will only be discarded after the president, the Secretary of Defense, and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff certify that changing it will not hurt the armed services' readiness, morale or cohesion. After a 60-day review by Congress, the Pentagon is to develop procedures for ending it altogether, a process that could take months or years to complete.
Sen. Levin said he would be watching the military carefully as the certification and implementation process moves forward. But he could not yet say how long would be too long.
"I just think we'll know it when we see it," Levin told Politics Daily. "But right now we've got to just be optimistic and be confident, particularly with these leaders." Levin credited Mullen's early support of repeal for giving the legislative process momentum when it needed it most.
"I don't have any doubt that he is going to be pushing this quickly and at the appropriate speed and in the appropriate way," Levin said. "This is a totally doable deal."
Sen. Collins told Politics Daily that she expects it to take months, not years, but said that the military needs time to create and hold training sessions for servicemembers and to work through any issues associated with the implementation.
But Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), an early advocate for repeal this year, said Congressional passage of the bill makes one immediate change in military policy. "No one will be dismissed under this policy ever again," she said.
