On December 6th, President Obama announced that he was going to compromise with the Republicans and extend the Bush era tax rates for all Americans in exchange for extending the unemployment benefits another thirteen months. Within minutes, our "principled" Congressmen and women, Left and Right, began caterwauling about "tax breaks for the rich" and the cost of extending the unemployment benefits. They took to the microphones and Sunday morning talk shows and decried their political opponents' lack of compassion or lack of fiscal discipline; each trying to claim the moral high ground. They spoke as if the very idea of this compromise put a nasty taste in their mouths.
Senator Reed said that there was a lot of work that needed to be done in order to make this deal viable. Silly me! I assumed he meant that our legislators would have to spend long hours working on the language to get it just right. No, what Senator Reed meant was the real work of Congress - not crafting law but political wheeling and dealing. Now less than a week later the fruits of their labor are becoming apparent. The bill received a test vote in the Senate and was approved thanks to billions of dollars worth of pork-laden earmarks. These people just can't help themselves! Funny how bacon makes everything taste better, isn't it?
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