Republicans Trash Popular Bills, Blame Democrats
In their continuing streak of never-ending filibusters, Republicans have trashed two important bills in the Senate this week, and then have gone off blaming Democrats for the failure to pass the bills.
The two bills are a five-year, $286 billion farm bill, and a bill that would “patch” the Alternative Minimum Tax, adjusting it for inflation so it would not unintentionally catch millions of people in the middle and upper middle class.
Both bills were stopped dead because Republicans insisted on planting poison pills–volatile political bombs like repealing the estate tax–into both bills, forcing Democrats to either pass legislation they would choke on, or to vote against what Republicans could call “tax cuts” in election-year campaigning. Democrats refused to allow the amendments, so Republicans engaged the filibuster and shut down the vote.
And then blamed the Democrats.
So, what else is new?
Exactly! Ain’t nothing new under the sun—especially in politics.