Senate Republicans Block Energy Bill
WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Republicans blocked a broad energy bill Thursday because it included billions of dollars in new taxes on the biggest oil companies.
Democratic leaders fell one vote short, 59-40, in getting the 60 votes needed to overcome a GOP filibuster. Democrats said they would strip the taxes from the legislation to move the bill forward.
Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said he hoped to get the revised energy package approved later in the day, including the first increase in automobile fuel efficiency in three decades and massive increases in the use of ethanol as a motor fuel.
He said we will “eliminate the tax title.” [my emphasis]
First of all, the AP is completely wrong, as David Roberts points out. It was a repeal of the tax breaks that oil companies got as a reward for jacking up their prices in 2005. Furthermore, this is plain evidence that the oil companies own 41 votes in the Senate. The whole thing came crashing down because 41 senators chose to keep insanely wasteful tax breaks for oil companies when we're running huge deficits. You know, maybe “partisanship” isn't the problem; maybe the headlock of special interests on 40% of our Congress is why we don't do what needs to get done.
I don't know what the roll call was, but I'll find out.
That much I know.
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p>Man I’m irritated.
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p>Here’s the good news: if the Dems pick up a seat in the senate in 2008, there’s your 60. If they pick up 2 or 3, there’s a little buffer, and maybe an even stronger version.
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p>I know people feel frustrated because the Dems seem to keep losing. But, they’re moving the debate. They’ll get some of what they want and we’ll see what Bush does with it. Keep hammering at it, and then in 2008 [with a gain in the Senate], push for even more.
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p>And how the GOP calls eliminating subsidies “raising taxes on one industry” is beyond me. I’d love for Uncle Sam to give me tax subsidies, then “raise my taxes” by removing those subsidies years later. I’d love to suffer through such a hardship.
Every society just gravitates to a system where those with wealth and power seek only to maintain their wealth and power. Take the Senate as a prime example. You have the offspring of the powerful maintaining and perfecting laws that serve their class. I doubt if anyone seriously believes that support for the “common man” exists in Senate chambers.
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p>The Congress mimics the Senate with the few exceptions of real working people. Both houses are caught up in the paranoid phase of passing laws designed to revoke those given in the Constitution. The latest, HR 1955, indicates they fear the people they tell us they represent.
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p>Does it not seem odd that in the little play of “House and Senate” the administration seems to be able to win by a vote or two with the Democrats majority? (Is the term: “farce”?)
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p>The fact is that there is the “Party of Wealth Maintenance” and a few other people scattered in congress. Check your history and you’ll see that this is a constant problem in this country’s history. In the 1930’s the elite envied Italy. In the 1940’s the National Association of Manufacturers had our lawmakers eating out of their hands. The 1950’s and beyond brought the Military Industrial complex that profited so well from the Cold War and then the War Without End.
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p>Today, with incredible amounts of cash and favor at stake, the politicians are eager to get on a stage and publicly praise AIPAC, an lobbying outfit known for outright bribery and alleged spying. (Is there no pride in the “leadership”? — Of course not!) The good folks at AIPAC know the way to support the elite and take full advantage.
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p>Years ago the political left provided a small rudder to keep the ship of state out of the reef of tyranny. Today, those people are gone and the conservatives that used to have a philosophy of a sort, now they have collapsed into the barking dogs of the social elite (Neo-Cons).
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p>Are We The People doomed?
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p>Of course the next stage in history is the infighting among the elite for the scraps of the decayed society…
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p>“Whenever a man has cast a longing eye on offices, a rottenness begins in his conduct.”
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p>-Thomas Jefferson
Louisiana makes a lot of money — both the state [taxpayers] and the employees [also taxpayers] — from oil and gas located in the marshes and off shore. I suspect that’s what the lady from Louisiana was doing with her no vote.
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p>Out of curiosity, which side of this bill which effectively failed 59-40* was the “Party of Wealth Maintenance” vote?
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p>The Yahoo story has this tidbit:
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We take to the barricades? Perhaps Pelosi and Reid should try moving a tad bit toward the center where Ms. Clinton now resides. Give it the old test of reasonableness.
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p>Fear not, many of the republicans in leadership clandestinely torpedoed the building of “The fence.”.
Explains why many repubs are leaving/resigning. They have become null and void and unelectable.
Do you think that the majority of Americans support big tax credits for oil companies? Run that one by Gallup and come back to me.
But the average American doesn’t vote. He/she is on the couch watching American Idol!
over 50% of Americans eligible to vote do vote every four years. Just sayin’.
..they would recognize the fact that the filibuster rule isn’t legislation set in stone. If they really were in favor of moving the bill further, they’d revise the rule, which would only require a majority.
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p>Obviously, the Senat Dems aren’t in favor of moving the bill forward. They’re worthless.
is that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander, as the saying goes. If the GOoPers can’t filibuster an energy bill, then when the shoe’s on the other foot (i.e., when control of the Senate changes hands, which it will eventually) the Dems won’t be able to filibuster anything else.
Couldn’t they force the Republicans to actually get up and blather to maintain the filibuster? Thereby testing their resolve, and potentially creating some news coverage or footage of Republicans fighting the not-so-good fight on behalf of their owners?
I was on a conference call with Senator Kerry last night w.r.t. the energy votes. Others on the call were the NRDC, a reporter from Grist magazine, bloggers, and some others whose name/affiliation I didn’t catch.
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p>This idea of setting up cots and forcing the GOP to actually filibuster was a frequent question/tone. My recollection of Senator Kerry’s answer:
1. the Senate has work to do, and the year is running out. We can’t lose time to the filibuster when we’ve got other important [and good] work to do.
2. the American people will hear GWB talk about the Congress not getting it’s work done, and it will play badly for the Democrats. Sure, the Ds may make the GOP look bad on energy, but the Ds will look bad in general for not getting the work done.
3. Next year the Dems will pick and choose some issues and force the GOP hand. Since 2008 is an election year, I suspect [and Kerry did not say] that it will force those GOPs up for reelection to waver on their steadfastness to Bush.
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p>I asked Kerry if the Democrats were planning strategies for the 2009 session, banking on having a few more Ds in the Senate and perhaps no veto threat from the White House. His response: no! We’re focused on now, working hard. We’ll work at it all next year too.
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p>
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p>It was a long day for Senator Kerry, and he’d just recently gotten back from Bali. As such, he was clearly tired and I suspect it was his frustration with the 59-40 vote that came through in his words and tone.
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p>Having written that, my spin is this:
1. The Democrats have got to pass more spending bills early, so they’re not under the gun later. Get a few quickies through, keeping their powder dry for later battles and leaving some time for banging their issues drums.
2. The Dems got 59 votes on a dang good [relatively speaking at least] energy bill. In 2008 I think the Dems will pick up 1-4 Senate seats. This bodes well for the future — the Dems got some now, will fight for an improvement next year, and in the 2009 session should be primed for a really strong bill.
3. In that regard, the Dems have got to be able to tell the voters in fall 2008 that they’ve gotten good things for the people. They got some ethics reforms, some student loan reforms, the first CAFE increase in 30+ years, a the first minimum wage increase in 10ish years, and more. They’ll have to explain to voters that their lack of progress w.r.t. Iraq, health care, and immigration was because of GOP obstruction and not their own ability.
Several, basically unrelated issues
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p>…as I predicted on Nov 8 2006, this congress will be a “do nothing” congress, primarily because a petulent child president is in office.
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p>I would not be surprised if the Republicans run against this congress, as they did in 1948, on the basis that it has been a “do-nothing” congress. They will try, but they will fail.
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p>I suspect, but cannot prove, that Dems will pick up more than 4 senate seats, just based on the numbers.
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p>CAFE is an irrelevant issue, given the increase in gasoline prices. The CAFE issue primarily involved SUVs, and sales of them appear to be dead in the water, hence Ford’s and GM’s economic problems. Daimler-Chrysler gave up on Chrysler in part because of that (German managers aren’t quite as smart as they would like us to believe they are).
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p>Ethics is kinda/sorta an issue, but most voters will believe that both parties are corrupt. Don’t rely on that as an issue.
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p>Iraq? Maybe. But this is not like Vietnam, when middle class kids were subject to being drafted to become cannon-fodder in the conflict. It was at that point that Vietnam became an issue.
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p>Health care? Don’t be so sure. We’ve discussed this here before.
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p>Immigration? When the immigrants displace middle and upper middle class workere, it will become an issue. Not till then.
Poll after poll shows that Americans want the US gov’t to require higher fuel efficiency.
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p>Study after study shows that Americans do not use economic rationality to incorporate the price of gas in the total cost of ownership. Roughly, they only account for the first year of fueling the car — so while higher gas taxes do shift consumer demand in the direction one would expect, they don’t do it very effectively.
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p>Is CAFE air-tight? Nope, and so-called flex-fuel is a gap big enough to drive an E85 Hummer through. But, it is one tool of many being used to try to cajole Americans to consume less fuel.
largely because of the huge increase in the price of gasoline. I suspect that we will see what effect that price increase has in the next few years. The sad fact is that the vehicles now on the street are not subject to CAFE standards–they’ve already been sold.
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p>I’m not sure about SUVs, but it is my understanding that they are not subject to CAFE either, since they are considered “light trucks.” Perhaps an odd designation, but apparently they are basically vehicles that are constructed on a light-truck wheelbase.
The Dems could, if they really wanted to pass a bill that they knew could be filibustered, change the filibuster rule, pass the bill, and then revert to the old rule. I’m no expert on Senate rule changes, but there is certainly nothing in the Constitution to prevent that from happening.
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p>I suspect that they don’t really care about the bill, they just want the issue for the next election.
…at the time filubustering began, I guess that’s correct. But it was a Democrat-controlled Senate in 1917 that allowed for cloture.
who reduced the threshold from 2/3rds [of either those present or total; that rule changed back and forth] to 3/5ths of those sworn in [currently 60 of 100].
…that reduction required for invoking cloture was occuring about the time that Republicans were gaining strength in the Senate.