After All The Huffing And Puffing Tax Cut Bill Passes
After all the handwringing and some delaying tactics by progressives in the House, Obama’s tax cut deal passed the U.S. House last night 277-148.
Because the package that passed the House is identical to the version that passed the Senate earlier this week, the bill will head directly to the White House for Obama’s signature.
House Democratic leaders had planned to tie a bow around the Obama tax cuts early this afternoon. But a bloc of angry progressives scuttled that plan. In a move that surprised aides and members, they temporarily derailed a key procedural measure required to pass the bill. The tactic was meant to register their disapproval with the legislation, and the terms of the debate, both of which were designed without their input.
Ultimately, several more amendments to the bill were allowed to be voted on. One changed the estate tax portion of the bill slightly, which failed. One underreported story will be how the Tea Partiers are already betrayed – only 36 Republicans voted against the bill in the House. Most of the no votes came from progressives.
But the bulk of progressives ultimately voted against the underlying bill. It passed with the support of a coalition of Republicans — most of whom supported the compromise — and Democrats — some of whom supported it, and others of whom agreed to vote for it to break the gridlock. In the end 139 Democrats (a majority of the caucus) and 139 Republicans voted yes; 112 Democrats and 36 Republicans voted no.
BTW, Kucinich voted for the bill. Castle voted yes.
I’ll add a note here. I don’t love this bill but I understand what Obama is doing. He decided the unemployment extension and additional stimulus was more important than ending the tax cut orgy for the rich at this time. This sets up another fight for later. Now is the time to start the next fight. Let’s not wait again until it’s too late. It starts now. Keep communicating with legislators on why it is so important to end the payroll tax holiday next year and to make sure that the tax cuts expire as scheduled. Make it the political winner it should be and you should have no problem convincing people to vote your way. This means persuasion.
Persuade them to do what exactly? They are already persuaded. Obama and nearly all Democrats professed to be against the tax cuts they just voted for. Agreement is easy to obtain, but follow-through seems unattainable. That is what we are contending with.
To persuade, you need a big bag of carrots but also a big stick. And if the donkey still won’t pull the cart you have to get another donkey.
Try persuading Democrats to fight (that includes bloggers). And if persuasion and communication don’t work, make sure you have a Plan B.
Here’s a good rule of thumb: If you are spending more time talking about social issues than about taxes and the economy, you are losing.
After squandering the insurmountable opportunity of tax cut expiration, how can Democratic legislators fight, and how can we help them? Here’s how:
For the next two years the legislative debate will be over Republican-driven spending cuts. Remember we still have the White House and the Senate. So the Republicans are handing us hostages – (the spending cuts they desire).
Democrats cannot afford to play defense on spending cuts. We need to grab the hostages, blindfold them and wrap them in duct tape, and figure out what to demand as ransom. That is what we need to “persuade” our Congress and our President to do.
I say the ransom should be tax increases on the rich. Every spending cut should meet a death by Senate committee or veto pen, if it is not accompanied by an incremental tax increase on the rich, until all the tax cuts for the rich have been clawed back.
Right now our legislators think we live in fear of tax increases or benefit cuts. We need to tell them this is cowardly and wrong. We need to let them know they can put those chips on the table if that’s what it takes to win. Persuade them that we refuse to be hostages anymore and that we refuse to let the rich steal the country using us as an excuse.
In the meantime we will have our hands full persuading Democrats not to implement the catfood commission report.
In my fantasy world the best way to persuade the Senate is for a real Democrat to kick Tom Carper’s butt in a primary.