Posted on 12/15/2011 3:01:48 PM PST by bananaman22
Edited on 12/15/2011 5:28:29 PM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
There’s cynicism, and then there’s Congress.
In the latest example of dysfunctional Congressional gridlock, the Democratic-led Senate is certain to reject a House of Representatives-passed Republican bill, House Resolution 3630, the 369-page ‘‘Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2011,’’ to extend the payroll tax cut.
The sticking (sticky) point?
Oil - specifically, dirty Canadian oil derived from Alberta’s oil sands, and the Keystone XL pipeline cutting across Middle America to deliver it to Gulf Coast refineries. On 10 November, four days after 12,000 pipeline protestors encircled the White House, President Obama announced "the decision on the (Keystone XL) pipeline permit would be delayed until at least 2013, pending further environmental review.”
As a fillip to the hard pressed American working class, the Republican House of Representatives proposed legislation would extend the payroll tax cut for 160 million workers for another year as well as extending long-term unemployment benefits. Approved 234 to 193, the legislation would extend a one-year break in the payroll tax due to expire at the end of the month, continuing the current payroll tax rate of 4.2 percent instead of allowing it to lapse and revert to its previous 6.2 percent level, a $1,000 difference for a family making $50,000.
Even better, the legislation would also renew expiring extra benefits for long-term jobless people and temporarily sidetrack a proposed cut in doctors' Medicare reimbursements, which could prompt some physicians to stop seeing elderly patients utilizing the program.
Sound great, right? Why aren’t Democrats reaching hands across the bipartisan divide to embrace the initiative?
Because, in a gesture of cynicism unusual even for Washington, the House Republicans have added to the legislation a provision to force work to begin again on the proposed 1,700-mile-long TransCanada Corp.'s $7 billion Keystone XL pipeline, which would transit up to 830,000 barrels of oil sands...
Full article at: Like Lazarus, Republicans Attempt to Revive Moribund Keystone XL Pipeline
What’s the slant of this website?
geez... biased much? (the author)
Why didn’t she just title this “Can you believe what those evil Republicans want to do with filthy canadian oil to kill you and pollute everyone?”
He states that the Canadian oil has 14% more carbon than other crude, like it’s a bad thing. Doesn’t that mean it has more energy/vol?
Well, personally, I think it is the payroll tax cut that is the “gesture of cynicism” — not an income tax break, but shorting social security, already in financial trouble, and, unless someone has the guts to change it, an entitlement so the money is coming back out of us somehow, somewhere, sometime. Big tax break. /s
Those evil bastards!
“Dirty Oil”? Oh man! Some oils have more naptha and the sort. These oils make better lubricants than they do fuels, but they can still be refined into whatever is desired — it just costs more. We’re past the point where we can be picky.
Oil - specifically, dirty Canadian oil derived from Alberta’s oil sands,
Dirty, filthy, slimy, nasty, rotten, corrupt republicans want you and your chilrun to breathe filthy, dirty, nasty air and drink filthy, dirty, nasty, polluted water {or even piss}, and 8100 of the poor and the wymen and chilrun and blacks will die because of these filthy, dirty, nasty, corrupt rotten republicans congress critters.
That about sums it up.
I’m always wondering why Canada just doesn’t build refineries near the oil.
I’m starting to get fed up living in a country where 50% +1 believe that kind of crap.
Fixed it.
Who'd have thought that we'd have to force jobs on people? I guess the alternative is to just keep extending unemployment benefits to people?
-PJ
So compromise equals “gridlock”?
They probably don’t have local demand for the products.
Yep, creating 200,000 jobs is the height of cynicism.
I think Barry is just trying to ween everyone off their FICA contribution so they won’t pay any taxes at all. They already don’t pay income taxes (at lower levels) and their only contribution is the FICA. Get that down to zero (sorry employer, you still pay) and it will be hell to try to get them to pay income or payroll taxes in the future.
But don't you see all those employers are the one percent, and should pay double, so employees should not have to pay at all.
Social Security and Medicare go bankrupt, the economy tanks, riots result, and Big Brother comes to the rescue with a Socialist Dictatorship. He'll be putting himself into Nativity Scenes in the future, just like Chavez.
But don't you see all those employers are the one percent, and should pay double, so employees should not have to pay at all.
Social Security and Medicare go bankrupt, the economy tanks, riots result, and Big Brother comes to the rescue with a Socialist Dictatorship. He'll be putting himself into Nativity Scenes in the future, just like Chavez.
Oh No!!! The dreaded hydrocarbons. Dirty, dirty oil flowing into our country from the evil Canada. Damn those republicans. Just damm.
Time to demand that Congress pass a resolution identifying Marxism Leninism as incompatible with the Founders vision, and expelling all Marxists from Congress.
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