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Subscribe to RSSNBC’s Ken Strickland reports: The Senate is expected to vote today two competing versions of bills that fund the government for the rest of this year. The exact timing of the votes hasn't been set, but will likely be mid-afternoon according to Democratic and Republican aides. Neither bill is expected to get the 60 votes required to advance, but will set the stage for addition negotiations. The Republican bill is the one already passed by the House, cutting spending by roughly $61 billion from current levels. The Senate Democrats' version cuts spending by about $6 billion.
The Hill: "After losing round one of the budget battle last week, Democrats are hoping that the votes will represent a turning point in the budget talks. The competing bills have little chance of attracting the necessary 60 votes for passage, but Democrats are hopeful they’ll get more yes votes than the GOP. If that happens, Democrats argue, Republicans need to come closer to their budget-cutting number."
But Democrat Joe Manchin (WV) doesn't like the idea and he's going to criticize President Obama for lacking leadership on the budget negotiations. He'll deliver today a tough floor speech criticizing both parties and the idea of holding the votes at all.
"Why are we engaging in this political theater?" Manchin is expected to say, according to prepared remarks. "Why are we voting on partisan proposals that we know will fail, that we all know don’t balance our nation’s priorities with the need to get our fiscal house in order? Why are we doing all this when the most powerful person in these negotiations - our President - has failed to lead this debate or offer a serious proposal for spending and cuts that he would be willing to fight for? … The truth of the matter is that this debate, as important as it is, will not be decided by House Republicans and Senate Democrats negotiating with each other -- or past each other. This debate will be decided when the President leads these tough negotiations. And, right now -- that is not happening."
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Get this. Our Tea Party governor is putting forth budget proposals to cut welfare in the state of Maine. (Pause while Tea Partiers clap enthusiastically.) Among his proposals is to limit the amount of time a recipient can receive aide, to five years. Here's where ideology runs smack dab into reality: 71 percent of recipients receive benefits for 1 year or less; 85 percent receive benefits for 2 years or less. Recipients are dropped from the program if they fail to take steps towards self sufficiency, it just isn't true that people are staying on welfare forever.
Another proposal from the Governor: deny benefits to legal immigrants. During his election campaign, LePage actively spread the false idea that people move to Maine for our "generous welfare benefits." The only problem with this statement is...well, Maine has the lowest benefit amount in New England, basically $485.00 a month for a family of three, and...more welfare recepients leave Maine in a year than move here.
It's not that I am a bleeding heart liberal, honestly, it's the false information I can't stand. We should make decisions, in my opinion based on based and not on ideology.
http://www.maine.gov/dhhs/realfacts/top_ten_tanf.htm
Quite a bit off topic Amy, but I digress. A source of your statistics would be helpful for it sounds like your governor is a tad bit lenient. Would it suit you better to see the limit placed at 1 year? As for your other allegations appropriate state of maine.gov links would be beneficial as well as mainstream media links.
Then again, what politician doesn't apply spin to their actions?
"It's not that I am a bleeding heart liberal, honestly"
Um...yes you are. You cant stand any sensible limits on government giveaways...any idea that smacks of personal responsibility hurts your leftist ideology , that the poor are all a helpless "class" that must be permanently subsidized.
If you argue most welfare recipients arent on the program very long, then why oppose a 5 year limit? You make no sense.
"A source of your statistics would be helpful for it sounds like your governor is a tad bit lenient."
I guess you didn't notice the link I posted to the MAine government website, you can click it, it works and everything!
http://www.maine.gov/dhhs/realfacts/top_ten_tanf.htm
The point is why propose legislation that does virtually nothing? If 2 in 10 welfare recipients are on the program for longer than 2 years, then enacting legislation for a 5 year limit is kind of useless, isn't it?
I mean, how much money does this save? It sounds as it it saves nothing or a paltry amount if anything.
Amy's point ( if I understand it ) is that the changes being enacted do nothing but sound tough.
@Bob - regardless of your politcal affiliation, aren't you tired of politicans who sound and act as used car salesmen? As a tax payer, I'd rather my politicians put their time ( = my money ) on something that actually accomplishes some substantial goal than just creating rules that have no impact.
The current Federal budget conversations today are the exactly the same thing. All talk. no real substance.
I agree that there need to be limits on unemployment checks but is this what you want Bob, a rule that does nothing ? Seems to me if the governor REALLY wanted to impact budgets and save money he would have gone for a 1 year limit.
sorry amy, I didn't see it, my error.
"If you argue most welfare recipients arent on the program very long, then why oppose a 5 year limit? You make no sense."
Clearly, if someone is on this program for longer than five years, they have some serious problems since the program has built in regulations that move people into self sufficiency or drops them from the program if they are not complying. Considering 85% of recipients leave after two years, I think we can afford to support the really sad cases who can't. Believe it or not, not everyone has your I.Q., youth, and good mental and physical health. How much will LePage's cuts save us if 85% of recipients are gone at two years? Not much.
sorry amy, I didn't see it, my error.
no worries, this light font is hard to read.
especially with progressive lense at 2 feet from the monitor.
I agree our politicians spend way too much time and our money promoting themselves. I wonder if any of them know how much it costs to run congress for a day. If it came out of thier campaign chests they might learn to get to the point and stop grandstanding. Much like Peter King and his anti american committee. he will spend $100 million to find out that muslims are just like the rest of americans and in the end know solutions will be obtained. To be fair, Obama's deficit commision cost a pretty penny to and what do we do ignore them. But he will get a lot of free press
Yep, a $6 billion cut is really something! I thought the republicans compromised when they lowered their cut to $61 billion from $100 billion. If one were to believe reids fear mongering about the loss of 700000 government jobs and reported big drop in GDP, perhaps a review of bernankes comments under interrogation last week is in order.
Even using reids jobs loss number WRT $61 billion cuts may prove enlightening as those cuts will stimulate the economy by an additional 9 billion dollars using liberal democart numbers.
We should make decisions, in my opinion based on facts and not on ideology.
I can easily agree to that.
Some want us to believe the government is broke so we don't have to fix things that need fixing -- you know and to also stimulate jobs!
And, an "irresponsible media" also fails to inform us that the first government shut down began under a Republican President -- President Ronald Reagan; now that is what I call "compassionate conservatism".
http://blogs.cqrollcall.com/trailmix/2011/03/obamas-shutdown-leverage-video.html
angellight - by what stretch of your imagination is it that the government is not broke? Does America have the ability to pay off its debt tommorow? Next month? Next year? The government is living off of borrowed money and the promise to pay it back with interest.
What is your point about reagan??? This is 2011.
It depends on your definition of broke. We currently could afford to pay our bills if we wanted to, be we choose not to. Some might say that doesn't meet the definition of broke.
Tim - perhaps, but why don't we? And yes I realize that we are currently recovering from a recession.
Within the strictest definition of "broke" we have not arrived yet. But at what point will it occur that our creditors will demand payment in full for what is owed, or at what point will people and governments refuse to buy our treasuries or at what point will the government encourage the FED to print tons of money and at what point will our currency stop being the worlds standard currency?
@american-2051576 - Are you a homeowner? If so, can you pay off your debt tomorrow, Next Month, Next year ?
Are you broke if you can't ?
If you do have a home and a mortgage and kids, then you too may be living off borrowed money ( your mortgage ! ) and the promise to pay it back with interest.
Don't believe ALL the hype. If America was really broke, it would make huge steps to reduce spending ( How about bringing home the troops from Afganistan who use ~ $2 Billion per day ) and increase income ( Taxes ) to compensate. How about closing military bases in Germany - which were placed there to fight the cold war against Russia? How about canceling the space program altogether ( NASA ) ?
Neither of these actions is being done. Both Dems and Repubs (and Tea partiers ) loved the extension ofthe Bush tax cuts.
The "we're going broke fast" is more fear-mongering
why it comes back to regan is because he started the problem! Remember trickle down (ie supply side economics?) Regan started it and it has destroyed our economy. Demand creates jobs not tax cuts. Keynes was right!
Until the Democrats can come forward with substantial cuts to the ideological spending the debate on balancing the budget can not begin. On one hand ,republicans, we debate cuts that in all honesty are not near enough. On the other hand we have a group, democrats, that want to push the debt down the road to our children.
While I think more cuts are needed I hope the Republicans hold the Democrats to task to put forward at least and equal amount of cuts. As far as the Senate number of votes thing goes, I hate to tell Reid, but he already lost the vote count even if half of the Senate republicans don't show up, but then again only Democrats don't show.
The same can be said about Republicans, and getting over their ideological crusade that taxes can never be raised, no matter what. Until they acknowledge that sometimes taxes need to go up, as Reagan did, we will never balance the budget. Spending cuts alone won't do it.
Tim,
Was it not the Senate controlled by Democrats, a House Controlled by Democrats, and a President that was a Democrat that extended the tax cuts about 4 months ago?
It was, in a compromise with Republicans that also increased spending. In a bi-partisan fashion, they decreased our revenues and increased our expenses, the worst possible thing to do to fight our budget problems but one they thought was worth it for the sake of the economy. All I'm saying is that it is wrong to blame one party for our budget problems when the other is clearly not innocent either, and that it will take both spending cuts and tax increases to fix this.
Thanks Tim !
Understand that the tea party leads ( M. Bachman ) was complaining when Democrats wanted to raise taxes on anyone making more than $250k - the comment was that this is not a lot of money for a family, with kids in college and a house mortgage. So they were all for letting the tax cust stand.
Its the same tea party that is complaining about the teachers in WI how are making $80k which is way too much for a teacher to make ( including benefits )
You can't have it both ways - or wait...yes you can if you live in America and have access to cameras and the news media.
Glory~
The proposed Republican cuts aren't designed to create even one job and Repub leaders are crystal clear about this. They know their budget proposal will cost us hundreds of thousands of ('So-be-it') lost jobs. It will cut thousands of jobs.
You know that Republicans will only discuss non-military discretionary spending, which represents only 13% of the overall budget under review?
The President already gave Congress an overall budget which will bring annual domestic spending to its lowest share of the economy under any president in more than 50 years. Briefly, it will bring the deficit down by one trillion dollars over the next ten years.
I will be as kind as I can in saying that Repubs in Congress may be choosing, but they are not choosing a path of recovery or future success for the American people.
Tim,
So with their super majorities they felt the need for the compromise. I guess the fault of the tax cuts getting extended all falls to the minority then or at least the majority. Oh, and might as while pile the increased spending on them also. lol
Backhouse,
The POTUS budget made multiple assumptions that honestly were very optimistic to say the least. It was not a plan for getting this nations finances under control. Also he was using his Obama Care savings as a key and it has already been brought to light that the savings it brings are increased taxes and double counting of savings. Otherwise it actually costs those with current health care coverage more. I guess you mist that little article that lasted like an hour on the web. If Senate democrats believe that the Obama budget was that great why didn't they use it for their plan? Instead they like their little pet projects that would be kept if we keep financing at the same level.
Also since the Governments job is defense and not social programs and giving money to unions I believe the military budget is the last place that should be looked at, but looked at in the end for some waist.
During a hearing on Capitol Hill Thursday, the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) admitted to double-counting in the Obamacare budget.
In her first appearance before the House Energy and Commerce Health Subcommittee since the health-care law passed, Kathleen Sebelius responded to a line of questioning by Republican Rep. John Shimkus of Illinois about whether $500 billion in Medicare cuts were used to sustain the program or pay for the law.
"There is an issue here on the budget because your own actuary has said you can't double-count," said Shimkus. "You can't count — they're attacking Medicare on the CR when their bill, your law, cut $500 billion from Medicare."
He continued: "Then you're also using the same $500 billion to what? Say your funding health care. Your own actuary says you can't do both. […] What's the $500 billion in cuts for? Preserving Medicare or funding the health-care law?
Sebelius' reply? "Both."
Apparently sebellus didn't understand the question. She's a newby right? Perhaps she also didn't read up on obamacare because of its length, after all if it was good enough for pelosi ity must be good.
The executives at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which distributes the taxpayer money allocated for public broadcasting to other stations, are generously compensated. According to CPB's 2009 tax forms, President and CEO Patricia de Stacy Harrison received $298,884 in reportable compensation and another $70,630 in other compensation from the organization and related organizations that year. That's practically a pittance compared to Kevin Klose, president emeritus of NPR, who received more than $1.2 million in compensation, according to the tax forms the nonprofit filed in 2009.
Despite how accessible media has become to Americans over the years, funding for CPB has grown considerably. In 2001, the federal government appropriated $340 million for CPB. Last year it got $420 million. As Congress considers ways to close the $14 trillion deficit, cutting funding for the CPB has even been proposed by President Obama's bipartisan deficit reduction commission. Instead, Mr. Obama wants to increase CPB's funding to $451 million in his latest budget.
Meanwhile, highly successful, brand-name public programs like Sesame Street make millions on their own. "Sesame Street," for example, made more than $211 million from toy and consumer product sales from 2003-2006. Sesame Workshop President and CEO Gary Knell received $956,513 in compensation in 2008. With earnings like that, Big Bird doesn't need the taxpayers to help him compete against the Nickleodeon cable channel's Dora the Explorer
Newmalthus - Obama's bipartisan deficit reduction commission was just a sham. No politician wants to impliment its recommendations, they would rather just kick the can down the road.
The republicans $61 billion in cuts for FY 2011 is a start and even bernanke doesn't see it as the economy destroyer that reid and his cronies do. I did so like the report on bloomberg tv that the democrats wanted bernanke to support their higher numbers while the republicans wanted him to lower them.
Poor bernanke, the FED was created to guide American monetary policy and the politicians want him to support their fiscal policies. Surprised bernanke kept his cool under interrogation.
A little off topic, but very important:
The Washington Post along with other leading newspapers have details concerning the War on Young Voters taking place in states across the country.
For example:
"New Hampshire's new Republican state House speaker is pretty clear about what he thinks of college kids and how they vote. They're "foolish," Speaker William O'Brien said in a recent speech to a tea party group."
"Voting as a liberal. That's what kids do," he added, his comments taped by a state Democratic Party staffer and posted on YouTube. Students lack "life experience," and "they just vote their feelings."
"New Hampshire House Republicans are pushing for new laws that would prohibit many college students from voting in the state - and effectively keep some from voting at all."