With only 7 legislative days left until House Republicans head out on a five week recess, yesterday the GOP held vote after vote after vote to rename ten post offices and courthouses and today will waste taxpayer dollars with more of their trademark bills to nowhere. The middle class has noticed:
Fifty-seven percent of voters said congressional Republicans have impeded the recovery with their policies, and only 30 percent overall believe the GOP has done the right things to boost the economy… [The Hill, 7/23]
Holding middle class tax cuts hostage to unnecessary, deficit-busting tax breaks for the top 2 percent? GOP says yes—and these numbers tell you all you need to know:
98: Percentage of Americans Whose Tax Cuts Held Hostage by GOP
2: Percentage of Top-Earning Americans GOP Protecting
$930 Billion: Amount Tax Cuts for Top 2 Percent Adds to Deficit
$2,200: Tax Increase on Typical Middle-Income Family of Four if GOP Holds Hostage for the Top 2 Percent
97: Percentage of Small Businesses Whose Tax Cuts Held Hostage by GOP
1: Person Giving GOP Marching Orders, Named Grover
Threatening a crisis for America’s family farmers? GOP says yes.
Politico: Congress delays farm bill as drought spreads
To understand how far this Congress will go to kick the proverbial can down the road, consider the farm bill — yes, the farm bill.
In the midst of a severe drought, the House Republican leaders are proposing to walk away from farm states and decades of precedent by not calling up the new five-year plan before the current law expires Sept. 30…
Never before in modern times has a farm bill reported from the House Agriculture Committee been so blocked. POLITICO looked back at 50 years of farm bills and found nothing like this. There have been long debates, often torturous negotiations with the Senate and a famous meltdown in 1995 when the House Agriculture Committee couldn’t produce a bill. But no House farm bill, once out of committee, has been kept off the floor while its deadline passes.
CQ Today: Drought Tests House GOP Leaders
Putting tax cuts for the wealthiest ahead of our troops? GOP says yes to that too.
President Obama: “Instead of making tough choices to reduce the deficit, they’d rather protect tax cuts for some of the wealthiest Americans, even if it risks big cuts in our military…I disagree. If the choice is between tax cuts that the wealthiest Americans don’t need and funding our troops that they definitely need to keep our country strong, I will stand with our troops every single time.”
Ignoring America’s top priority, job creation? Of course the GOP says yes!
Huffington Post: Republican Jobs Bills Won’t Actually Create Jobs, Say Economists
House Republicans routinely beat the drum about the hard work they have done in passing “more than 30 jobs bills” that are now before the Democrat-controlled Senate, going nowhere, as the economy gasps for air…
But there’s a problem with their jobs bills: They don’t create jobs. At least, they won’t any time soon.
In interviews conducted by The Huffington Post with five economists, most said the GOP jobs package would have no meaningful impact on job creation in the near term. Some said it was not likely to do much in the long term, either.
“A lot of these things are laughable in terms of a jobs plan that would produce noticeable improvements across the country in the availability of employment in the next four or five years,” said Gary Burtless, a senior economist at Brookings.
America’s middle class families deserve more from the do-nothing, GOP-led House.