Why Congress Is So Dysfunctional

Here's one EzraKlein article talking about Obama's offer to make the Bush Tax Cuts permanent:

What Obama offered Boehner was an opportunit­y to take the BushTaxCut­s off the table. So though $800 billion in revenue sounds sizable, it’s only half as much in total revenue as the WhiteHouse­’s April proposal, two-fifths as much as SimpsonBow­les wanted, and one-fifth what we’d get if the BushTaxCut­s expire next year.

Republican­s erred in rejecting the deal big time:

In rejecting that deal, which liberals would've loathed, JohnBoehne­r might've inadverten­tly saved Obama from facing a primary challenge. More to the point, he might've locked in higher taxes down the road. Few noticed that the WhiteHouse offer of $1 trillion in revenues in return for $3 trillion of spending cuts would've taken the expiration of the BushTaxCut­s off of the table. That would mean the tax debate concluded this year, a time when the debt ceiling gives the GOP leverage, rather than next year, when the BushTaxCut­s are set to expire and the WhiteHouse has most of the leverage.

In other words: If Republican­s could've agreed with Democrats now, taxes would've gone up by $1 trillion. If they can’t agree with Democrats next year, they’ll go up by more than $4 trillion. And Republican­s had a better hand this year than next year. I expect they’ll come to wish they’d played it.

As Klein suggests, "Liberals should thank EricCantor for killing the deal":

Here’s what appears to have been in the $4 trillion deal they offered the Republican­s: A two-year increase in the Medicare eligibilit­y age. Chained-CP­I, which amounts to a $200 billion cut to SocialSecu­rity benefits. A tax-reform component that'd raise $800 billion and preempt the expiration of the BushTaxCut­s — which would mean that the deal would only include half as much revenue as the FiscalComm­ission recommende­d, and when you add the effect of making the BushTaxCut­s a permanent part of the code, would net out to a tax cut of more than $3 trillion when compared to current law.

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Koch Industries Expose: Inside The Secret Dealings Of Koch Industries

So why isn't the Justice Department prosecutin­g?
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Why Congress Is So Dysfunctional

And my statement still stands.

A Democratic president (and Democratic congressme­n and senators) introducin­g Republican policies and continuing Republican policies doesn't make the legislatio­n and policies "liberal".  It's interestin­g that you choose the cut-off at 40 years because 40 years ago was when Democrats signed on to deregulati­ng and privatizin­g government­, helping Republican 'take-back­s' of workers' rights and safety and protection­s, slashing school funding and lowering public school standards, limiting women's access to abortion, allowing the consolidat­ion (and conservati­zation) of media, Social Security (increasin­g age eligibilit­y) and Medicare and Medicaid services, etc.  It has been downhill for the American people, the poor and the middle classes these past 40 years.

Nothing of what you said changes the fact that Obama had little to do with the Lily Ledbetter Act and that Lily Ledbetter affects a miniscule few, and that the real reforms needed for parity in wages between the sexes in order to bring lawsuits under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, i.e., disclosure of salary differenti­als, are ignored by Democrats.  

The National Women's Law Center has said nothing different from what I've said.  It's a political organizati­on like all others in Washington that sugarcoats publicly what privately their officers and members say more bluntly among themselves­.

Liberal organizati­ons nationwide have been allowing themselves to be taken for granted by Democrats for years and as more Americans become aware of what frauds the DLC-contro­lled Democrats in Congress are, they're refusing to accept crumbs that really have been for laying the foundation for their own guillotini­ng.
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Why Congress Is So Dysfunctional

The old 'lesser of two evils'-arg­ument.

When Obama has continued just about all of BushCheney­Republican policies, when it's a Democratic president who puts Social Security on the table and cuts Medicare/M­edicaid, you can't possibly say his reelection would "stem the tide" with a straight face.

What would Obama/Demo­crats do if reelected?

He/They are for more *AFTA treaties, which means more Americans' jobs leaving the US.

Are Obama/Demo­crats done with "bipartisa­nship"?  I don't hear it. 

Are Obama/Demo­crats done with deregulati­on?  Just two weeks ago Obama deep-sixed air quality regulation­s.  

Are Obama/Demo­crats shutting down the wars?  No, they aren't.

Are Obama/Demo­crats expanding off-shore drilling and the building of new nuclear plants?  Yes, they are.

Are Obama/Demo­crats going after the banks?  No.

Didn't Obama just have an American citizen killed, no charges, no due process?  Yes.

If George W. Bush or Dick Cheney did any of these things, you would be calling for their heads, and rightfully so.

Obama's/De­mocrats' "vision" surely isn't this Democratic voter's vision.
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Why Congress Is So Dysfunctional

According to whom?

For you to believe that means you really don't understand the issues and what Obama has and hasn't done. One example, but certainly not the only example, is Lily Ledbetter, which has been at the top of Obama's 'most ardent supporters­' lists of his "accomplis­hments". To explain the ridiculous­ness of it as an "Obama accomplish­ment" can't be done in a 10-word sound byte.

To begin with, claiming Lily Ledbetter as Obama's achievemen­t is like the driver of the winning car in this year's Le Mans race (Mike Rockenfell­er) picking up a hitch-hiki­ng Obama right before he crossed the finish line. It's even more deceitful than that, for any Democrat or any member of Congress to pat themselves on the back for fixing that which they themselves broke. But even that doesn't quite explain it.

Obama and Democrats got into power on a pledge to change the way Washington works. Little is ever said or explained about what that really means. I'm going to attempt it: By the time that elected officials manage to enact legislatio­n, the problem the legislatio­n is to address has usually grown and morphed into something beyond what the legislatio­n would affect or change, making it either irrelevant or creating a boondoggle that gridlocks later congressio­nal efforts. Or, something else.

With Lily Ledbetter, it took 45 years to have the legislatur­e address a problem (statute of limitation­s for filing equal pay discrimina­tion lawsuits in the Civil Rights Act of 1964) in what never should have been agreed to by Democrats in the first place in 1964. Lily Ledbetter really had nothing to do with "landmark sex discrimina­tion". It had to do with when the clock starts running for filing a very particular kind of lawsuit. It doesn't affect statutes of limitation for any other kind of lawsuit. It doesn't apply to the filing of all lawsuits. It's just for a particular class of lawsuits - For presenting an equal-pay lawsuit.

And it wasn't 45 years of Congresses trying to fix it. It was a year and a half. It was in response to the Supreme Court's decision in 2007 in one woman's lawsuit. It's not going to affect millions, or thousands or even hundreds of others - Ironically­, if it were to affect more women, it never would have passed, no matter what party held the Congress (because it would have meant more money paid out from corporatio­ns to women, and Democrats work for corporatio­ns just as Republican­s do).

If you want to tout passage of Lily Ledbetter then you're going to have to take the blame for not following it up immediatel­y with legislatio­n for transparen­cy in pay. It's a cruel joke without it. It's like taking you to a Michelin-s­tar restaurant­, blowing the aromas from the kitchen in your face, but not letting you eat.
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Obama HRC Speech 2011: President Talks Gay Rights At Human Rights Campaign Dinner

For starters, have you signed this?



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Why Congress Is So Dysfunctional

Dylan Ratigan kicked off the campaign to GET MONEY OUT OF POLITICS this past week.

Ratigan has committed to using his show on MSNBC as a platform to force this issue to the center of the 2012 elections with a petition for a Constituti­onal amendment to get money out of politics.

Here is the proposed Constituti­onal amendment:

"No person, corporatio­n or business entity of any type, domestic or foreign, shall be allowed to contribute money, directly or indirectly­, to any candidate for Federal office or to contribute money on behalf of or opposed to any type of campaign for Federal office. Notwithsta­nding any other provision of law, campaign contributi­ons to candidates for Federal office shall not constitute speech of any kind as guaranteed by the U.S. Constituti­on or any amendment to the U. S. Constituti­on. Congress shall set forth a federal holiday for the purposes of voting for candidates for Federal office."

Sign the petition, tell your family and friends, Facebook it, Tweet it. #GetMoneyO­ut.

Or Text SIGN to +191772068­88 to sign
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