Just hours after the House passed a deficit plan championed by House Speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio), the Senate voted to table the bill, effectively killing it. On Saturday, even before the Senate could vote on the proposal put forward by Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) — he doesn’t yet have the 60 votes required to pass it — the House returned the favor by voting down Reid’s plan.
Eleven Democrats (Barrow, Boren, Braley, Loebsack, Matheson, McIntyre, Peterson, Ross, Schrader, Visclosky and Wu) joined Republicans to defeat the measure, 173 to 246.
This is probably where everyone who was cheerleading for the Senate to defeat the Boehner bill will now rage righteously at the House.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIf I've understood the House-defeated Reid bill correctly, it's essentially the same as the House-passed Boehner bill, but without the Balanced Budget Amendment.
Hopefully the House Republicans will recognize this and continue on in the same pricipled direction. Forget all the nonsense about planning for bogus savings over ten years (which are really increases, because of baseline budgeting). Stick to the here and now, and keep building the pressure on the Senate.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI think the other big difference is that Reid increases the debt ceiling enough to get past the 2012 election, matched with phony "spending cuts" from expected troop reductions in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe phony "spending cuts" (I agree with characterizing them as such) were also in Paul Ryan's budget, so I call shenanigans on complaints about that.
But really, having this debate again in 6 months would be an absolute disaster on the markets, as many economists have explained. But sure, if you wanna call it a punt, go for it. I don't want to deal with this again until we have a new president either. Whether you want to blame Dems or Republicans for this current impasse, or want to take the very MSM-trendy "both sides are to blame" route, the truth is, the debate between the current parties, no matter whose fault it is, is a catastrophe for this country, and let the next election decide who will rehash it. No new spending will authorized with this congress anyway, because of the power of the Tea Party caucuses, so lets let the market stabilize, get through the election, and start over.
Once we have a Republican president in 2013, he (or she!) and the GOP-controlled congress can feel free to never raise the debt ceiling again and balance the budget with no revenue increases in two presidential terms (two!). I will give anyone willing to take the wager one full year of my salary ($45k) if that occurs.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYes, I should mentioned the ceiling being stretched out beyond the 2012 elections. As for considering the phony savings in both bills, none of us have that much time to waste.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAppropriate outcome. However, I'm wondering how either chamber can vote down the other chambers' "plan"? It doesn't have to become a bill first to be voted on?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDo you think the headlines in the media will say this defeat was a BI-PARTISAN defeat?
Not on the Washington Post website. Not in the interior of the article, however, because of the 4 squish Republicans who didn't sign the letter, the Post was able to say there might be a bi-partisan solution ie one where the GOP caves, I guess.
NY times - nope.
LA Time - not even a hint of the issue on the home page.
CNN.com - nothing, in fact, it seems like they plagiarized the NY times.
Not even a mention on Foxnews.com
Plus ca change, plus ca meme chose.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI think it is becoming clear that the only way to pass a debt ceiling increase is to craft something acceptable to most of the GOP and a few of the more moderate Dems. I suspect Reid will end up bringing up something pretty similar to the proposal that Boehner was forced to pull. Reid could likely get half his caucus to go along, and I'd expect probably 35-40 Republicans to support that as well. If Pelosi releases her moderates, they'd provide Boehner with the extra handful of votes he needs to get through the House. I doubt Obama would veto it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt'd be catastrophically stupid to help the Democrats out by ending this battle prematurely. The voting public is just beginning to get a glimmering of an understanding of the issues involved here. Let's not pull the rug out from under them by caving to any ceiling increase at this time (and I'm for none at all).
We can bully the Democrats into fleeing on major issues. We need to press on.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI guess Wu is going rogue. If his fellow Dems didn't hate him for the Tigger costume and the sexual deviancy, they'll sure hate him for this.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe only differences between Boehner's original bill and Reid's bill sans the phony war cuts in Reid's are these:
Reid's cuts 8b less in total
Boehner's cuts a little bit more in year 1
Reids extends the debt ceiling past the election
Both bills are pathetic and useless. Neither does anything whatsoever to solve the debt crisis. Both will increase our debt burden by trillions of dollars over the next decade. Neither will balance the budget.
If the GOP goes along with this scam, the party is dead to me.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWu? Wow. Must have been one of his crazy days.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDirty Harry's bill is on life support in the Senate and DBA (dead before arrival) in the House--a fitting end for a piece of nothing but political horse manure.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHas anyone noticed the dearth of Media Matters' trolls here lately? They're usually the first to post.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis is all too funny.
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