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Under increasing pressure from Democrats and members of his own party, Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) Tuesday night abandoned his one-man filibuster of a one-month extension to unemployment benefits and other programs. In the end Bunning agreed to a deal allowing him one vote on an amendment to pay for the bill’s $10 billion cost. That proposal was offered by Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) last Thursday at the start of his filibuster, but Bunning rejected it because he feared his amendment would not pass. Reid has also agreed to give Bunning two votes on...

On Today's Show... March 2, 2010   Howard Fineman Wants to Know Where Health Care Money Goes Howard's trip to an Argentine hospital draws a response. (Rush 24/7 Members: Listen) » Howard Fineman: What the Debate Should Be About »  Mitch Daniels:  Hoosiers and Health Savings Accounts   Sen. Jim Bunning Drives the Left Nuts for Standing Up to Big Spending The unemployed aren't going to be cut off, but the Senate should stick to its paygo rule and pay for it. For this stand, the media is describing Bunning as if he were the nasty Harry Reid.   ...

Senator Jim Bunning (R-KY) has drawn a line in the sand over the left's rampant deficit spending and demanded that Democrats actually start following their own "pay-as-you-go" rules...

While Senate Republicans have started to bail on Sen. Jim Bunning and his one-man Senate filibuster, House Minority Leader John Boehner is backing the Kentucky Republican’s efforts to stall an unemployment benefits, COBRA and highway funding bill. “I think Sen. Bunning has a legitimate argument he’s making. The Democrats just passed this pay-go legislation, and not even a week after the president signed it into law, they want to exempt the first bill that comes to the Senate floor,” Boehner said in a press conference Tuesday. Earlier Tuesday, Sen. Susan Collins criticized the Bunning for holding up federal unemployment benefits,...

WASHINGTON — Senator Jim Bunning, who chose not to run for re-election, appears willing to take the heat for holding up unemployment benefits and shutting down highway construction projects around the country. Other Senate Republicans, who are hoping for big political gains this year, are not so eager. With Mr. Bunning’s objection to extending jobless aid quickly becoming a national cause célèbre, his colleagues were trying to find a quick resolution to an impasse that was not only having direct consequences on some of their constituents, but also doing some political damage to the Republican brand as well. Senator Mitch...

Waiting all day for this. Happy to see it.

Jim Bunning, whose Father's Day perfect game gives many Phillies fans smiles even after 46 years, has thrown the Democrats and their enablers a curve that should bring smiles to all who care about this country. The major-leaguer turned Kentucky senator has by his lonesome blocked a bill that would extend unemployment benefits and health insurance for the millions of Americas who have been out of work for months in the Obama economy. Pretty mean, huh? Well Bunning points out that the bill he is blocking adds $10 billion to the deficit which is spiraling out of control under our...

WASHINGTON – To the increasing discomfort of his fellow Republicans, Sen. Jim Bunning on Tuesday again blocked the Senate from extending unemployment benefits and health insurance subsidies for the jobless. The Kentucky Republican objected to a request by Maine Sen. Susan Collins, a fellow Republican, to pass a 30-day extension of jobless benefits and other expired measures. The measure would also extend highway programs and prevent a big cut in Medicare payments to doctors. Bunning has been single-handedly blocking the stopgap legislation since Thursday... ----- Bunning made the following quotes on the floor of the United States Senate: "I believe...

Senator Jim Bunning (R), the 2nd term junior Senator from Kentucky, has been roundly criticized by the Democratic candidate for the Senate, Daniel Mongiardo, for blocking additional deficit spending. What the main stream media does not point out is that Bunning has suggested the use of Stimulus Funds to cover the extension of benefits rather than reaching into tax-payers’ pockets for an additional $10 billion. Other candidates have weighed in on this issue: “I support Senator Jim Bunning. Frankly, unemployment benefits are currently 99 weeks or almost two years. While I support extending the benefits for a short period of...

The dysfunction of the Senate has now reached cruel depths. First we watched as Republicans systematically chose to filibuster every major vote, effectively ending majority rule by requiring 60 votes to get anything out of the Senate. Now, one Republican senator, Kentucky's Jim Bunning, who is not running for re-election, employed this power of obstruction to block a 30-day extension of unemployment benefits, aid for COBRA health insurance payments and a range of other key programs. Even while his Republican colleagues admitted that eventually -- perhaps soon -- they will renew the program, one senator ended unemployment insurance extensions for...

Washington White House spokesman Robert Gibbs on Tuesday stepped up the war of words that the Obama administration has been directing at Sen. Jim Bunning (R) of Kentucky, saying at a morning meeting with reporters, “I don’t know how you negotiate with the irrational.” Since this past Thursday, Senator Bunning, who is not running for reelection, has been blocking an extension of unemployment and health benefits for jobless workers. He did it again Tuesday morning, objecting to a request by fellow a Republican, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, to extend the expired benefits for 30 days. Mr. Gibbs has acknowledged...

WASHINGTON — The effort to end a Senate standoff over unemployment benefits and health coverage for the jobless escalated on Tuesday morning as Senator Susan Collins, the moderate Republican from Maine, became the latest lawmaker, and the first Republican, to try to override the objection of Senator Jim Bunning, Republican of Kentucky. The White House, meanwhile, called Mr. Bunning’s actions “irrational.” Ms. Collins, who took the floor shortly after the Senate convened, said her effort was being made on “behalf of numerous members of the Republican caucus who have expressed concerns to me.” “There are 500 Mainers whose benefits expired...

WASHINGTON — The effort to end a Senate standoff over unemployment benefits and health coverage for the jobless escalated on Tuesday morning as Senator Susan Collins, the moderate Republican from Maine, became the latest lawmaker, and the first Republican, to try to override the objection of Senator Jim Bunning, Republican of Kentucky.

On the floor of the Senate, Republican Jim Bunning of Kentucky just defended the position he's taken that has delayed an extension of jobless benefits for the nation's unemployed and has forced the furlough of about 2,000 federal workers. Saying that he has blocked votes on the legislation to underscore his opposition to the ongoing growth in federal debt, Bunning read a letter from "Robert in Louisville," who told the senator that even though he hasn't been working regularly in the past two years he supports what Bunning is doing.

Quite an ingenious and hypocritical scheme that Democrats are using against Sen. Bunning. A.) First the Democrat-controlled Congress urges that we must have Paygo. Obama even chimes in that Paygo is necessary because Congress and the federal government must live by the same rules that Americans have to live by: pay-as-you-go. B.) Pass Paygo and then sign it into law. C.) Then the Democrats can urge that a bill (like in this case) must be passed and say that it is absolutely necessary to pass this bill - while they don't placing any funding within the bill to actually fund...

In January, the Senate joined the House in passing "pay-as-you-go" rules to require Congress to pay for new discretionary spending. On Feb. 12, President Obama signed the bill. "Now Congress will have to pay for what it spends, just like everybody else," Obama crowed. Less than a month later, Obama and fellow Democrats are busily demonizing a lone senator for pushing Washington to spend responsibly. It seems this administration is all for fiscal restraint - as long as you don't mean it. The story began last week when Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Ky., blocked Senate passage of a bill to extend...

In January, the Senate joined the House in passing "pay-as-you-go" rules to require Congress to pay for new discretionary spending. On Feb. 12, President Obama signed the bill. "Now Congress will have to pay for what it spends, just like everybody else," Obama crowed. Less than a month later, Obama and fellow Democrats are busily demonizing a lone senator for pushing Washington to spend responsibly. It seems this administration is all for fiscal restraint — as long as you don't mean it. The story began last week when Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Ky., blocked Senate passage of a bill to extend...

Sarah Palin stormed the bestseller list last year with "Going Rogue"-a political memoir whose title coyly referenced the former GOP vice presidential nominee's supposed defiance of the consultants running the McCain campaign. But this year we have a new poster boy for the Going Rogue playbook: GOP Sen. Jim Bunning of Kentucky. For the past week, Bunning has been single-handedly blocking more than a million Americans from receiving unemployment and COBRA health insurance benefits, as of today, when their benefits funded under the 2009 stimulus law run out. The suspension of benefits affects everyone from doctors to government employees

Republican senator gives journalist the middle finger Posted: March 1st, 2010 04:03 PM ET Washington (CNN) - An angry Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Kentucky, refused to answer questions from CNN and ABC News Monday afternoon about his decision to block a bill that would extend unemployment benefits to millions of jobless Americans. An ABC News producer who was there says Bunning gave him the middle finger in response to a question. CNN's Dana Bash and a CNN camera crew tried to get Bunning to comment more extensively on the controversy on Monday. But the senator "got very angry," she said. "Excuse...

I usually support ambush interviews like this one, but Sen. Bunning has already answered this question repeatedly. He is blocking the extension of unemployment benefits because [gasp!] he actually believes it should be paid for.