Senate Defeats Effort to Add Corporate Tax Break to Stimulus
A glimmer of hope for something other than business-as-usual legislating emerged in the Senate last night. The proposed "repatriation" tax break, a major gift for multinational corporations with questionable stimulative value, was defeated on a 42-55 vote.
Seven Republicans, including some of the most conservative senators, joined the majority of Democrats to beat back the repatriation proposal -- which would have largely benefited a handful of corporations that are among the biggest job-outsourcers in the nation. A tip of the cap to those 55 senators.
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Josh
Matt
Eric
Brian
Yes!
February 4, 2009 9:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
So Republicans want more tax cuts for the rich but they don't more spending on transportation. Are these people really that stupid or are they just trying to run this country into the ground.
February 4, 2009 9:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm actually starting to believe that they really are that stupid and delusional by the way. It's getting to the point that they will be starting to say "Let them eat cake." Can you imagine if the republicans somehow won the last election? Oh my God, we would be in totally deep shit.
February 4, 2009 10:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
Deeper than every American losing their job next month without this bill?...and over half the country losing their job twice?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8hMJVXt09E
February 4, 2009 10:11 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oh give me a break. She made a slip up. She meant 500,000, which is how many jobs we have been losing a month for the last 6 months.
At least she can speak in complete sentences and isn't delusional like the king and darth vader.
February 4, 2009 10:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
go easy on wallace. petty, meaningless mistakes is all he has to cling to as he yearns for daddy W's reassuring smirk.
February 4, 2009 11:10 AM | Reply | Permalink
They don't care if they run the country into the ground, as long as they and their class get rich in the process.
February 4, 2009 10:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
"Are these people really that stupid or are they just trying to run this country into the ground?
Yes.
February 4, 2009 1:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
The fact that was even brought up to a vote is a disgrace.
February 4, 2009 10:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
True, but I'm happy to get a bit of good news for a change. I'll take it.
February 4, 2009 10:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
Every time a vote like this happens, a little bit of backbone starts to grow in Congress...
February 4, 2009 10:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Now that is being optomistic. Maybe a tiny, tiny, little bit. We would need thousands and thousands of these types of votes to even get started with a backbone.
February 4, 2009 10:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, there goes that lobbying effort down the drain!
February 4, 2009 10:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ok, this really is getting scary. Panasonic is shuttering 27 plants and laying off 15,000 workers.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090204/ap_on_bi_ge/as_japan_earns_panasonic
The last time that the whole world slumped into a massive recession at the same time was . . . . the Great Depression. We have massive problems right now. This is scarier than any boogeyman sitting in a cave in pakistan.
February 4, 2009 10:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah we obliviously need more tax cuts for the rich. That way they can buy more expensive rugs, thats how we save the economy.
February 4, 2009 10:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, I don't see how tax cuts for the super wealthy are going to help out the world economy. We are in deep sh*t right now. I actually don't see how this stimulus package is going to help either. It really isn't enough spending, but you just can't do nothing. This whole thing is scaring me to death.
February 4, 2009 10:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
Did anyone actually click the link to the vote? The number of Dems who voted Aye is shocking and, maybe, suggests who will be problem votes as the debate goes forward.
February 4, 2009 11:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
What is up with Barbara Boxer? Has she decided that her future lies with the Blue Dogs?
February 4, 2009 11:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
Dems who voted "Yea"
Akaka, Bayh, Boxer, Fienstien, Liebercon, B. Nelson, Pryor, Ried, and Warner.
Some of them I'd expected better from (Boxer and Warner anyway)
Reps who voted "Nay"
Barasso, Collins, Enzi, Grassley, Murkowski, Sessions, Snowe
Interesting that Sessions, Barasso, and Enzi are on this list, and to a lesser degree, Grassley
February 4, 2009 11:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'd like to see Barbara Boxer pressed in an interview to explain her vote. All you need to do is make one example of how someone voted(who knows, maybe she had good reason) to hold these senators more accountable the next time.
February 4, 2009 11:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Boxer didn't just vote for it - she was a co-sponsor of the amendment.
February 4, 2009 11:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
USA/Today Gallup has Obama approval rating at 64% (where's ERIC!)
And then there is this
Bad question but still informative
1. The public obviously wants action
2. The public has probably confused the "Obama Plan" with the House passed bill
Lots of misinformation out there.
If only our news nets would cut back their coverage
February 4, 2009 12:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
In the past 8 years and the 12 years of the previous Republican administrations (81-93), was there ANYTHING passed to help people at the bottom without first including the 'cream' for corporations or tax cuts for the upper 1-2-3-4 or 5%? It seems the only constituents they have are corporations. Christ, they hardly pay taxes now to the federal government and locally they get tax abatements! What the hell is left to give them? It is obscene to forget those out of work, without health care or those who are at the mercy of their companies going bankrupt just to cancel union contracts. Reports out now show the wealthiest of us DOUBLED their money under Bush and the country is down the tubes.
February 4, 2009 1:38 PM | Reply | Permalink