Everyone happy now?
Related:
Sunday Globe Special: Broken City Contradiction
More Broken Congre$$ Crap
Sunday Globe Special: Broken City Fixed
It was never broken for $ome.
Now the military has been made whole!
"Congressional negotiators reach budget deal; Measure draws criticism from conservatives" by Jonathan Weisman | New York Times, December 11, 2013
WASHINGTON — House and Senate budget negotiators reached agreement Tuesday on a budget deal that would raise military and domestic spending over the next two years, shifting the pain of across-the-board cuts to other programs over the coming decade and raising fees on airline tickets to pay for airport security.
The deal, while modest in scope, amounts to a cease-fire in the budget wars that have debilitated Washington since 2011 and gives lawmakers breathing room to try to address the real drivers of federal spending — health care and entitlement programs like Medicare and Social Security — and to reshape the tax code.
Not the $714 billion bill for maintaining and expanding the empire.
"The compromise measure totals $632.8 billion, including funds for military pay, ships and planes, and $80.7 billion for overseas operations such as the war in Afghanistan."
Btw, they are NOT entitlements. They are services that have been paid for and were promised in return.
Related:
U.S. Government Stole Social Security Surplus
America’s Retirement Crisis Grows as Cities Raid Pension and Health Plans
Detroit Bankruptcy Means Government Can Break Promises
That's a bad sign for anyone with a pension.
For a Capitol used to paralyzing partisan gridlock, the accord between Representative Paul D. Ryan, Republican of Wisconsin and chairman of the House Budget Committee, and Senator Patty Murray, Democrat of Washington and chairwoman of the Senate Budget Committee, was a reminder that even fierce political combatants can find common ground....
Have you had it with the s*** shovel of political fooleys?
And to think the Globe wasted months on that broken city farce.
Both negotiators promised an end to uncertainty and the lurching from crisis to crisis, at least for a year.
The deal drew praise from House Republican leaders, who are likely to put it to a vote by Thursday....
President Obama also weighed in.
“This agreement doesn’t include everything I’d like — and I know many Republicans feel the same way. That’s the nature of compromise,” he said. “But it’s a good sign that Democrats and Republicans in Congress were able to come together and break the cycle of shortsighted, crisis-driven decision making to get this done.”
The proposal quickly drew fire from conservatives who saw it as a retreat from earlier spending cuts and a betrayal by senior Republicans.
People like me.
I hate my leadership, if you can even call me conservative or Republican any more.
Some excoriated Ryan, the party’s vice presidential nominee in 2012, for rolling back immediate spending cuts in exchange for promised savings that may never materialize....
Bu$ine$$ as u$ual then.
The agreement eliminates about $63 billion in across-the-board domestic and military cuts while adding $23 billion in deficit reduction by extending a 2 percent cut to Medicare through 2022 and 2023, two years beyond the cuts set by the Budget Control Act of 2011.
Under the agreement, military and domestic spending for the current fiscal year that is under the annual discretion of Congress would rise to $1.012 trillion from the $967 billion level it would hit if spending cuts known as sequestration were imposed next month. Spending would creep up to $1.014 trillion in the 2015 fiscal year....
Military spending would be set at $520.5 billion this fiscal year, while domestic programs would get $491.8 billion. The $63 billion increase during the next two years would be spread evenly between Pentagon and domestic spending, nearly erasing the effect of sequestration on the military.
And there it is.
Domestic programs would fare particularly well because the 2 percent cut to Medicare health providers would be kept in place, alleviating cuts to programs like health research, education and Head Start.
That is so Orwellian. The extended Medicare cuts will will help social programs.
The increase would be paid for in part with higher airline fees that underwrite airport security.
To pay for more tyranny so well-connected contractors like Chertoff can get their cut.
Higher contributions from federal workers to their pensions would save about $6 billion.
They f***ing you loyal and faithful folks. When will you stop trying to hang on and stand with us?
Military pensions would see slower cost of living increases, a $6 billion savings over 10 years. Private companies would pay more into the federal Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp.
States receiving mineral revenue payments will have to help defray the costs of managing the mineral leases, saving $415 million over 10 years.
The government, of course, gets mere pennies on the dollar for the resources extracted by private companies but that are allegedly owned by citizens and taxpayers.
Deep water, natural gas, and other petroleum research programs would end.
That's probably good.
Democrats gave up their demand that the deal extend unemployment benefits that expire at the end of the month, but they hope to press for an extension in a separate measure.
So that was a nothing bluff I read or just more bullshit in my paper?
For Republican leaders, the deal would erase the threat of another government shutdown Jan. 15, when the stopgap spending measure that reopened the government in October runs out. The government’s statutory borrowing authority will lapse as early as March, however, another potential crisis, but a budget deal allows Republicans to remain singularly focused on the health care law.
Put the focus on what?
I guess they at least telegraphed where the broken city coverage will be going the next few weeks (as the deadlines for registration for Obummercare kick in; agenda-pushing all the time, folks).
NEXT DAY UPDATE:
US cites rise in health plan sign-ups as Sebelius testifies
I hate being right all the time.
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Also see: Escape from the ‘Broken City’
I'm trying like hell.
"Senate confirms D.C. court judge; Lacking filibuster, GOP can’t stop votes on nominees" by Alan Fram | Associated Press, December 11, 2013
WASHINGTON — Democrats overwhelmed outnumbered Republicans and pushed a pair of President Obama’s high-profile nominees through the Senate on Tuesday, the first to win confirmation since the chamber weakened its traditional filibuster.
By 56-38, senators confirmed attorney Patricia Millett to join the influential US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Her approval tilts that circuit’s judges 5-4 toward those appointed by Democratic presidents, an important advantage for a court that rules on White House and federal agency actions.
The Senate then used a 57-41 roll call to confirm Representative Mel Watt, Democrat of North Carolina, to lead the Federal Housing Finance Agency. That bureau oversees the two giant taxpayer-owned home lenders, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
These approvals came after Democrats took advantage of the eased rules for ending filibusters. Until the changes, 60 votes would have been needed to end procedural blockades on nominees.
Later, senators voted 56-42 to end a filibuster against the nomination of attorney Cornelia ‘‘Nina’’ Pillard for another vacancy on the D.C. circuit. Her confirmation was expected later this week.nv
The votes came three weeks after Democrats made it harder for the Senate minority party — currently the GOP — to use filibusters to block nominations.
Filibusters for nearly all nominations, but not legislation, can now be ended by a simple majority vote instead of the 60 required since 1975. For decades before that, an even bigger margin, two-thirds, was needed to halt the delays.
So it is actually easier to get nominees through than it used to be?
Democrats and their allies hailed Tuesday’s votes as a triumph, with more to come.
Until they lose the Senate next year.
‘‘The minority caucus has dedicated the last five years to paralyzing the Senate,’’ said Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon, one among a cadre of newer Democratic senators who helped push party leaders to change filibusters. ‘‘Today I saw as a good sign.’’
I'm sorry, but I want this government paralyzed. Then they can't hurt anyone.
In retaliation for the filibuster changes, Republicans used the Senate’s own procedures Tuesday to slow its work.
They forced several procedural votes before Watt’s nomination could be approved and did the same on Pillard. They also blocked permission — usually granted routinely — for a pair of committees to meet for more than two hours while the Senate was in session.
‘‘It says that what they’ve done is wrong and there’s a price to be paid for that,’’ Senator Orrin Hatch, Republican of Utah, said of the GOP response. ‘‘These are not itty bitty problems.’’
With Republicans talking about using all the debate time that Senate rules allow, majority leader Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, has threatened to hold evening and weekend sessions.
The nomination fight is intensifying at the start of what Reid has planned as a final two-week stretch before adjourning for the year.
Back to that crap again.
During that time he wants approval of an emerging budget deal, a huge defense bill, and perhaps other measures.
I wonder what tax cuts for the wealthy and well-connected corporations are in the deal.
Reid also wants the Senate to confirm three other major Obama nominees.
They are US District Judge Robert Wilkins, who with Pillard would fill the two remaining D.C. circuit vacancies; Janet Yellen to chair the Federal Reserve; and Jeh Johnson to head the Department of Homeland Security.
Millett works in the Supreme Court practice at Akin Gump, one of the capital’s largest law firms. A Harvard Law School graduate, she served as an assistant to the solicitor general under presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.
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At least they agree on this:
"John Kerry defends Iran nuclear deal; Clashes with congressional panel over pact" by Bradley Klapper | Associated Press, December 11, 2013
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration and Congress clashed Tuesday over the historic nuclear deal with Iran, exposing deep rifts over a US pledge to refrain from any new sanctions over the next six months in exchange for concessions on enriching uranium. The disagreement could have broad consequences for the US diplomatic effort to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons.
In his first congressional testimony since last month’s Geneva agreement, Secretary of State John Kerry defended the diplomacy as having halted and rolled back central elements of Iran’s nuclear program for the first time. He pleaded with Democrats and Republicans alike not to scuttle the chances of a peaceful resolution to a crisis that has regularly featured US and Israeli threats of potential military action.
‘‘Let me be very clear: This is a very delicate diplomatic moment and we have a chance to address peacefully one of the most pressing national security concerns that the world faces today,’’ Kerry told the House Foreign Affairs Committee. ‘‘We’re at a crossroads. We’re at one of those really hinge points in history. One path could lead to an enduring resolution in the international community’s concerns about Iran’s nuclear program. The other path could lead to continued hostility and potentially to conflict.’’
Kerry’s appearance came as lawmakers increasingly threatened to undermine the six-month interim pact....
Because Congre$$ is AIPAC-occupied territory, even more than the executive and administration.
Senators Bob Menendez, Democrat of New Jersey, and Mark Kirk, Republican of Illinois, are close to completing a bill that would require the administration to certify every 30 days Iran’s adherence to the interim pact, according to legislative aides.
Without that certification, the legislation would reimpose all sanctions and introduce new restrictions on Iran’s engineering, mining, and construction industries. The legislation also calls for a global boycott of Iranian oil by 2015 if Iran fails to live up to the interim agreement. Foreign companies and banks violating the bans would be barred from doing business in the United States.
However, Iran sanctions were left off a defense bill working its way through the Senate this week — much to the dismay of Republicans.
The empire must be funded -- to the tune of $714 billion.
‘‘This is a rather transparent attempt to prevent a vote on enhanced Iran sanctions, so they’re trying to circumvent the Senate, pass major legislation, essentially without amendments,’’ Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky, told reporters.
In the House, Republican leader Eric Cantor is drafting separate legislation mapping out how a final deal with Iran should look, aides say.
Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, has warned any new package of commercial restrictions would kill the deal.
That is the intent and we all now why and for whom.
‘‘If Congress adopts sanctions, it shows lack of seriousness and lack of a desire to achieve a resolution on the part of the United States,’’ Zarif told Time magazine. ‘‘My parliament can also adopt various legislation that can go into effect if negotiations fail. But if we start doing that, I don’t think that we will be getting anywhere.’’
Related: Time names Pope Francis as Person of the Year
As with the Nobel, it is awarded for perceptions that push the agenda, not actual acts. Even some of the others mentioned deserved it more than Francis.
I would have given it to Putin because of Syria; the rest of the world wanted Snowden to get it, and even this Catholic says he would have been a better choice than Francis.
Kerry said new sanctions could also be viewed as a sign of bad faith by America’s negotiating partners — Britain, France, Germany, China, and Russia. The United States is banking on them to enforce existing oil and financial restrictions on Tehran and to press Iran into a final agreement.
The self-internalized values and per$pective are apparent in the choice of words.
‘‘I don’t want to give the Iranians a public excuse to flout the agreement,’’ Kerry said. ‘‘It could lead our international partners to think that we’re not an honest broker, and that we didn’t mean it when we said that sanctions were not an end in and of themselves but a tool to pressure the Iranians into a diplomatic solution. Well, we’re in that. And six months will fly by so fast, my friends, that before you know it, we’re either going to know which end of this we’re at or not.’’
Agree with that. Life is flying by fast now.
Kerry’s assessment comes just three days after President Obama began to play down chances for success, telling a think-tank forum that he believed the odds of a comprehensive nuclear agreement next year are 50-50 or worse.
That was directed as much at an Israeli audience as an American one. It's those interests among others that are important to government.
Still, Obama defended diplomacy as the best way to prevent Tehran from acquiring atomic weapons and rejected criticism from Israel’s government and many in Congress that his aides bargained away too much without securing a complete halt to Iran’s nuclear program.
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NEXT DAY UPDATE:
No farm bill in sight as recess looms for Congress
Money for the military but not for Food Stamps.
And the newest member of Congress:
"Katherine Clark to succeed Edward Markey in House; Very few voters, one new lawmaker" by Michael Levenson | Globe Staff, December 11, 2013
Democrat Katherine M. Clark cruised to victory Tuesday, capturing the congressional seat long held by Edward J. Markey, in a lightly contested special election that drew the lowest voter turnout of any recent US House race in Massachusetts.
Had I lived in the district I would have likely voted.
Clark will become just the fifth woman to represent the state in the US House, where women hold 18 percent of the 435 seats.
Turnout was a dismal 13 percent, which appeared to set a record for voter apathy in the state’s recent US House races. The previous low-water mark was the October 2001 special election that Stephen F. Lynch won with a 17 percent turnout.
I was told it was on September 11 of that year.
WTF, Globe?
Clark, a state senator from Melrose, won 40,172 votes, or 66 percent, easily defeating Frank J. Addivinola Jr., a Republican who had 19,319 votes, or 32 percent, for the seat from the Fifth Congressional District. Independents James Hall and James Aulenti each registered in low single digits.
Clark could be sworn in Thursday, as the least senior member of the minority party in a deeply polarized House and a Congress that will almost certainly go down as the least productive in modern history.
Yeah, yeah, we are tired of the endless distortions and narratives, 'kay?
In Washington, she has vowed to fight “extremist Republicans” on issues such as pay equity for women and abortion rights, but will face a daunting challenge, since the GOP controls both the chamber and the agenda in the House.
Thanks for contributing to the partisanship divide.
At her victory party Tuesday night in Stoneham, Clark acknowledged the dysfunction in the capital, but said she is determined to try to combat climate change, toughen gun laws, and fend off proposed cuts to Social Security and Medicare.
Just got a budget deal.
“We all know Congress is broken,” Clark said, according to a copy of her speech provided by her campaign. “But you’ve shown in this campaign that we are not going to sit on the sidelines and accept gridlock as the new norm.”
Tuesday’s outcome was never seriously in doubt, since the district is heavily Democratic and favored President Obama over Mitt Romney by more than 30 percentage points in 2012. Clark was backed by her party, as well as unions and women’s groups, and raised $1.2 million.
The state and national Republican parties had all but ceded the race to Clark, giving no financial help to Addivinola, a Boston lawyer who has run for office three times and does not live in the district. He raised $38,000 while loaning himself nearly $62,000.
It was 10-to-1 spending ratio with the Republican getting no help at all?
Born and raised in New Haven, Clark, 50, is a graduate of St. Lawrence University and of Cornell Law School. She worked for a large law firm in Chicago and in the office of the Colorado attorney general before moving to Massachusetts in 1995 to attend the Kennedy School of Government.
Since then, she has worked primarily as a public-sector lawyer, in the Massachusetts Office of Child Care Services and in the office of Attorney General Martha Coakley. She was elected to the Massachusetts House in 2008 and won a state Senate seat in 2010.
Perhaps her biggest legislative achievement is a 2011 law she cosponsored that made public employees work longer for fewer benefits in an effort to shrink an estimated $20 billion unfunded liability in the state pension system. Clark argued the cuts would ensure that the pension system remains solvent for future generations.
And she's a stalwart liberal?
She points to Senator Elizabeth Warren as a model of how she hopes to operate in Congress, fighting for liberal priorities. But she said she also believes she can work with the GOP on legislation to spur private-sector investment in energy-efficient buildings.
Why am I wasting my time with this shit?
Mickey Edwards, a former Republican congressman for Oklahoma, said Clark can be effective, if she is willing to work across the aisle and form relationships with Republicans, in the tradition of Thomas P. O’Neill Jr. and J. Joseph Moakley, two legendary Massachusetts Democrats.
“If you go there just to be another hard-line Democrat or another hard-line Republican, there to do battle with the other side, you’re meaningless,” Edwards said. “The whole place is filled with people like that.
“Being from Massachusetts is not a hindrance,” he added. “Being a freshman is not a hindrance. It’s that attitude that will determine whether she becomes another O’Neill or Moakley and another one of the successful Massachusetts politicians or whether, two years later, people say, ‘Who was that woman who won that special?’ ”
Women’s groups celebrated Clark’s election Tuesday as a milestone in Massachusetts, a state that, despite its progressive reputation, has a poor record of electing women to office. Clark will be the third woman in the state’s 11-member congressional delegation, joining Warren and Representative Niki Tsongas, Democrat of Lowell. That is the most women ever to represent the state at one time....
Related: Misogynist Massachusetts
Not me. I love women.
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