« BACK  |  PRINT

RS

MEMBER DIARY

Does GOP want to own Obama’s 20,000 lost Keystone jobs?

By: Mike gamecock DeVine (Diary)  |  December 20th, 2011 at 02:05 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

Claiming fatigue from kicking cans down the road, Speaker of the House John Boehner engineered a rejection of a Democratic Party-controlled Senate-passed bill that would have cleared the way for the Canadian Keystone Pipeline project that President Barack Obama has delayed for three years of “study”.

The bill, which also extends unemployment benefits and the payroll tax cut for 60 days, would have authorized construction on the oil pipeline from Canada to the Gulf unless the President explicitly rejected the project before March 1, 2011.

Instead, not only may the Obama Administration play both sides of the debate while raking in campaign funds from unions and environmentalists, but the Republican Party will more easily be depicted as Scrooges raising taxes on the poor and middle class and killing 20,000 jobs.

All because of a sudden ideological aversion to temporary tax measures that do nothing to provide incentives for job creators? How can this be when this same Speaker has had no trouble in kicking many such tax cut cans down the road over the past year. Other cans kicked down the road by the GOP House for fear of government shutdown ad campaigns have been refusing to remove ObamaCareimplementation funds from continuing resolutions; corporate welfare for food inflation-causing ethanol subsidies; and draconian debt ceiling “super-committee” defense sequestration cuts.

Before today’s action President Obama owned the killing of 20K good paying jobs at the behest of radical EPA regulators. Now, the mass-murderer of millions of jobs via non-stimuli, Dodd-Frank, Gulf Oil Moratoriums and ObamaCare bills gets a reprieve, courtesy of an early Christmas present from the most powerful Republican in America.

Is Boehner tired of being Speaker of the House of Representatives? Does he pine for the days of minority status and the resulting free time for more Marlborosand tee times?

How else to explain the rejection of the first gift from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and the Democrats in over three years?

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Tags: , ,

COMMENTS

POSTING RULES  |  LOGIN TO COMMENT  |  REGISTER TODAY
  • Kyle-MI

    and then the GOP House picked it up and ran it the wrong way into the opposing team’s end zone.

  • Death_of_the_Donkey

    and the payroll tax cut goes away, it is going to play poorly in the extending ALL of the Bush tax cuts debate that is going to consume much of the presidential campaign.

  • http://www.examiner.com/x-1597-Charlotte-Law--Politics-Examiner Mike gamecock DeVine

    Let’s re-work the tax code so that all federal income taxes are in one category. Social security benefits can be based on earnings with the same result if that is what people want. I favor reform to a Chilean-like system and/or means-tested system.. Plus, I want to formally end the fiction of an insurance program and that the poor and low income earners don’t “pay federal taxes”. They do, unless the EIC exceeds their FICA. more later

  • JSobieski

    The illusion of SS is a large political albatross

  • acat

    Who knows, it might even be something we can get past Congress…

    Mew

  • http://www.examiner.com/x-1597-Charlotte-Law--Politics-Examiner Mike gamecock DeVine

    be on to something!

  • Death_of_the_Donkey

    I never really saw the benefit of pretending we have separate pots of money , when whenever we had extra SS/Medicare money we just spent it on the other side anyways.

  • http://www.examiner.com/x-1597-Charlotte-Law--Politics-Examiner Mike gamecock DeVine

    the input

  • lastgopinillinois

    The bill would have authorized construction on the oil pipeline from Canada to the Gulf unless the President explicitly rejected the project before March 1, 2011

    Key phrase there is “unless the president rejects the project”

    And he WILL reject it regardless of whether the provision in the House bill is passed by the senate, or if the senate does not act upon the bill.

    0-bama will elect to retain the support from his environmentalists rather than throw them under the bus for 20,000 union jobs.

  • heraklios

    This was another con-job by Obama; it was always understood he would reject the project or the Senate wouldn’t have included the language.

  • Kyle-MI

    That is not the point. If it was, why didn’t he openly reject the pipeline? No, he tried to punt the project down the road until after the election. Why? Because if he decided either way he would anger one large chunk of his constituents (unions) or the other (environmentalist). He was trying to do what he always did in the IL Senate, just vote present and let someone else take the blame. By forcing him in a decision, the GOP tried to force him off the fence and generate anger at Obama from one part of his base or the other.

    And now those !@#&%##$%$&&#@@$$% in the House and Senate have let him off the %#$@$##@^^ hook. Worse, they have tried to switch horse in mid stream and &$#$#$@@&%$##@@^^^^^ the whole thing up. They now have the worst of all worlds. They will get blamed for not extending the tax cuts. They will get blamed for playing games. They will get blamed for wasting everyone’s time. And they will show themselves to be weak and pathetic politically. They can’t even play the game to win. They can’t claim to be above game playing because that boat already left when they voted the bill to the Senate.

  • Kyle-MI

    The man is literally irresponsible. Another point the GOP cannot make because they shot themselves in the foot over this.

  • heraklios

    He was able to get everything he wanted by offering a review of a project he knows he will never approve anyway. Our brain-dead GOP Senate leadership gave him everything for nothing. Why would he reject that?

  • http://www.examiner.com/x-1597-Charlotte-Law--Politics-Examiner Mike gamecock DeVine

    Merry Christmas from the occasional A-hole! smile

  • http://www.examiner.com/x-1597-Charlotte-Law--Politics-Examiner Mike gamecock DeVine

    argued my man!

  • Kyle-MI

    In hindsight he was able to get everything but only because BOTH the GOP House and Senate goofed and gave it to him on a silver platter. But even Obama never thought the GOP would be that incompetent. You cannot rely on your enemies cutting off their own head for you.

    You may be 100% certain that Obama wants the pipeline project dead, but his union supporters (especially the huge number of rank and file people who vote) need to believe that he could possibly approve the project. Otherwise he could loose a big chunk of the union voters. (The union leadership is another story.)

  • Kyle-MI

    That is a big compliment coming from you.

  • quill67

    The etnire 7.65% employee portion of payroll tax. This would be a big tax increase on people/busineses making over $100,000.

    My point is that we should think about what is best for our economy and job creation. I would like to save the 3% of my salary but what would the impact on job/business creation?