It's Our Washington

It’s Just Politics

The House overwhelmingly passed a bill Wednesday afternoon to allow the federal government to keep borrowing money until the middle of May, as Republicans attempt to defuse the debt ceiling as political issue.

The legislation, which was unveiled last week at a House Republican retreat in Virginia, passed on a 285-144 vote.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Wednesday the Senate will pass the House bill without changes, noting that the legislation is “clean,” meaning it contains no spending cuts. Republicans spent 2011 insisting on matching the debt ceiling with trillions of dollars in spending reductions.

“The president believes that we need to, as a country, do the responsible thing and without drama or delay, pay our bills, meet our commitments,” 

White House spokesman Jay Carney said after the vote. “It is certainly important to recognize that the bill that passed the House today, the position that House Republicans took beginning late last week, represents a fundamental change from a strategy they pursued up until that point…. We are glad to see that that strategy is not being pursued anymore, so this is a welcome development.”

This all means that the nation’s debt limit, once the most potent of political weapons, is off the table until May 18. Republicans hope that this focuses Washington’s attention on replacing the automatic spending cuts that hit the Defense department in March, government spending which expires at the end of March and prescriptions for entitlement reform.

In theory, the bill would also pressure the Senate to pass a budget — something it hasn’t done in several years. Under the legislation, if either chamber fails to pass a budget by April 15, its members will not get paid.  Read more:

 

Yeah right!   

There is no way that the Congress, either the Senate or the House, will do anything to jeopardize their paycheck nor will they do anything to prevent them from getting a special healthcare package not available to the rest of us, nor is there any way that they will willingly give up any of the perks associated with their elected office; however, they will argue and fuss, blame and point-the-finger, in an effort to delay legislation that would help the middle class either in the long run or the short run; and, it is nothing personal, it is just business…  no, not business but politics: politics at its worst.