Bunning Gives Up The Deficit Fight

Video: DEMs go on the offensive and attack Bunning

I admire the Senator for making a symbolic point about the debt and deficit.  In the end, the political flack was too much for Republicans to bear and they forced Bunning to cave.  Yes, Bunning supported the same when Bush was in charge, and so I agree it was hypocritical. 

But who are we to argue and complain when a Senator chooses to make a public relations stand against greater deficit spending.  So I won't.

Saying that he has blocked votes on the legislation to underscore his opposition to the ongoing growth in federal debt, Bunning read a letter from "Robert in Louisville," who told the senator that even though he hasn't been working regularly in the past two years he supports what Bunning is doing.

"This country is sooner or later going to implode because of the massive amount of debt run up over the past 40 or 50 years," Robert wrote, according to Bunning.

"Why now?" Bunning said he's been asked, regarding his objection to the legislation. "Why not now?"

And, he added, if the Democratic majority and many Republicans want to force action on the legislation, they should use the Senate rules to override his objection.

Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) Tuesday night abandoned his one-man filibuster of a one-month extension to unemployment benefits and other programs.

In the end Bunning agreed to a deal allowing him one vote on an amendment to pay for the bill's $10 billion cost. That proposal was offered by Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) last Thursday at the start of his filibuster, but Bunning rejected it because he feared his amendment would not pass.

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Bunning Accepts Deal On Jobless Benefits  (most complete link...videos)

Jim Bunning: Tea Party Darling

Bunning Defends His Position

Comments

[DailyBail]

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[DailyBail]

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[Wil Martindale]

This is a political "warm-up" for reconciliation on Health Care. Layers upon layers of deception and theatrics.
What Obama/Reid did was this: by using the "Unanimous Consent" procedure, they were demanding that all 100 Senators agree to a $10 billion extension of the unemployment benefits, etc. Harry Reid and his second in command, Dick Durbin (D-IL) confronted the Senate 10 times, on Friday and Monday, and 10 times the melodrama played out with Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY), objecting to the "UC."

Then the White House carried out a non-stop attack on Bunning, blaming him for a "one-man filibuster." Even two cabinet members, Labor Secretary Hilda Solis and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, put out statements blaming Bunning for cutting off funds to the jobless and transport workers.

The truth is that the Senate knew for months that the funds for unemployment and COBRA would run out on Feb. 28, and they could have brought the extension bill to a floor vote under "regular order" instead of stringing out the melodrama of the unanimous consent. But, as CNN reporter Dana Bash commented, the Democrats "know they have a good political issue right now," and they were not about to let go of the attacks on Bunning and the GOP to pass the extension which they could have done easily.

Bunning, in response to Durbin's repeatedly accusing him of "filibustering," countered the Big Lie on the Senate floor on March 1: first, he said that there had been "a bipartisan bill proposed by Senator Baucus and Senator Grassley that would have covered the extension of unemployment benefits, COBRA health care assistance, flood insurance, highway bill assistance, the doc fix .... [but] Senator Reid did not allow that bill to come to the floor and instead substituted his jobs bill." Secondly, that Bunning had worked out—under the now mandatory austerity "Pay Go"—a 15-week extension at the cost of $5 billion, taken from another part of the budget, and Reid ditched that. Thirdly that he never had used a "filibuster," but was only objecting to "unanimous consent," where a bill is passed without debate, and without a roll call vote. But the White House and some Democrats kept accusing him of running a "filibuster."

[DB's Ignored Conscience]

Are you against pay-go DB? I thought we were waiting for someone to take a stand on spending? Oh, he is a republican, never mind.

[setting record straight]

Just for the record, both Bob Gibson and Don Drysdale were considered meaner, dirtier pitchers in the 60's than Jim Bunning.