Senate passes unemployment extension 60 to 40
Breaking news message from Politico moments ago – (link):
Ending weeks of stalemate, the Senate cleared the way Tuesday for Congress to extend federal jobless benefits through November’s elections for millions of long-term unemployed.
Maine Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins were the sole Republicans to join Democrats on the 60-40 roll call, the outcome of which also rested on the arrival of West Virginia’s new senator, Carte Goodwin, sworn-in minutes before to replace the late Robert Byrd.
Going forward, the $34 billion unemployment measure is expected to take some hours more still before clearing the Senate, given the continued wrangling. But with the House poised to act quickly once the bill arrives, the bill could be signed into law this week.
An estimated 4.9 million idled workers have a stake in the federal extended jobless benefits, and close to half these individuals have seen their benefits expire since the first cut off in early June. For depressed states, any disruption in the federal payments impacts the local economy as well as the individual worker; tiny Rhode Island gets as much as $32.3 million a month.
WELL, THE NEO-CONS, HAVE ENOUGH MONEY TO GIVE THE RICH A BIG TAX CUT, AND FUND 2 STUPID WARS THAT WE NEED TO GET OUT OF, BUT THE HELL WITH THE HOME FRONT, WELL THE GOOD GUYS SHOWED UP YESTERDAY AND PUT THE NEO-CON PARTY IN ITS PLACE…GREAT GOING DEMOCRATS…KEEP UP THE GREAT WORK
July 21st, 2010 at 5:38 am