Stimulus Passes House With Zero Republican Votes

by: Chris Bowers

Wed Jan 28, 2009 at 18:13


The stimulus bill just passed the House, 244-188. Only eleven Democrats voted against it. Notably, zero Republicans voted in favor of it.

Cool. While we will need two Republican votes to pass the stimulus through the Senate, I'm glad no Republicans supported it in the House. Not only does it offer a clear contrast between the parties, not only does it give good reason to re-write the legislation without any concessions to Republicans when the bill is reworked in conference, but it puts a quick end to the "bi-partisan" charade of the last few days.

As demonstrated on so many occasions, most recently by the 95% drop in Republican support for TARP, almost all Republicans in Congress are bad faith actors. You can't compromise or appeal to people whose motives are simply to oppose you, rather than to actually stand for any principles or values (except, I guess, the principle of opposing you). The sooner congressional Republicans make their purely contrarian motives clear, as they have done in this case, the sooner we can move on to just passing good legislation. Let's drop futile attempts to appease those who caused our problems in the first place, and stay focused on cleaning up the mess they left.

Chris Bowers :: Stimulus Passes House With Zero Republican Votes

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Stimulus Passes House With Zero Republican Votes | 66 comments
extending fig leaves (4.00 / 6)
is fine and all but when push comes to shove Dems have to say: You gotta vote with us to play. No vote support, no money for your district. No vote support, nothing for your base.

Big payoff of Obama reaching across the aisle is the Repubs look like WATB obstructionists if they try to filibuster the stimulus bill.

Now we can drop the charade of getting Repub votes for the stimulus bill, we should strip out almost all of the tax cuts and replace with infrastructure.

So what will Obama's takeaway be? (4.00 / 12)

 Two possibilities:

 A) "Screw them. I tried to reach out, and all they did was drop their pants and moon the country."

 B) "Maybe if we make even more concessions next time they might come around."

 ANYBODY with an IQ in triple digits knows it's A.

 Obama's IQ is comfortably in triple digits.

 And yet, I'm not as confident in his judgment here as I should be.  

"We judge ourselves by our ideals; others by their actions. It is a great convenience." -- Howard Zinn

The sooner Obama realizes (4.00 / 5)
that the GOP wants him to fail and doesn't give a flip about his bipartisan talk, the better. FDR didn't give a damn about the Republican obstructionists, he set policy and rammed it through. Of course there are moments for compromise, but giving up $100 billion in infrastructure funding all to secure ZERO GOP votes is looking very bad right now.
[ Parent ]
FDR had to deal with the South (4.00 / 7)
More specifically, he had to appease the South on racial issues to ensure passage of the New Deal.

I've always maintained that talk about bipartisanship is mainly for holding the Democratic coalition together and gaining the votes of non-progressive parts of the Democratic Party, like the Blue Dogs.  With only 11 defectors, it looks like the Blue Dog caucus was split on this, which is a good sign.

The thing to watch here will be if Evan Bayh is able to form a Blue Dog-like Senate caucus.  Bipartisan language will make it much harder for Bayh to succeed in forming such a power base.

Things You Don't Talk About in Polite Company: Religion, Politics, the Occasional Intersection of Both

[ Parent ]
Swiss cheese intelligence (4.00 / 1)
Scott Peck, the psychiatrist-author, explains this quite convincingly in a book called People of the Lie.  Emotions get in the way of intelligence and can over rule intelligence.  With many people that can mean a few holes in a pattern of overall intelligence.  As psychological issues play a larger part in an individual's makeup, the number of holes multiplies and the person has what Peck describes as a swiss cheese intelligence.
[ Parent ]
This from a guy (meaning Scott Peck) estranged from his own children? (4.00 / 1)
That's a savvy enough way to sell self-help books- tell people their emotions will put holes in their thought processes if they don't get them in check through x, y, z process laid forth in his books- but how would he himself have been capable of working it out if it were in fact true?  
[ Parent ]
He'll (4.00 / 6)
make further concessions to McConnell in order to win the votes of a handful of Republicans who would've voted for the bill anyway.

How do I know this?

Because I live and breathe.

[ Parent ]
and to the CEOs he met with today too, & their lobbys -- (4.00 / 2)
they want more taxcuts -- and not to be responsible for healthcare or COBRA costs, etc.
[ Parent ]
David, your pessimism always makes me feel better. (4.00 / 3)
I fully expect more massive unnecessary giveaways to GOPers.
[ Parent ]
Well you know what they say (4.00 / 5)
Pessimists are usually right and when they're not, they're pleasantly surprised.
[ Parent ]
That's my life philosophy (0.00 / 0)


"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."
[ Parent ]
It exposes Republicans (4.00 / 11)
to be the party of Hoover and Bush.

As people lose jobs, they will remember, for a generation.  Their kids will grow up knowing which party gave a shit for working people.

provided Democrats don't bite their tongues (4.00 / 8)
I keep hearing 'the greatest crisis since the Great depression' but nothing about the Republican policies of the last 8 years. I keep hearing 'we need tax cuts' but not 'bush did that and look where it got us. why do you want to make the problem worse?'

Yes, if you look really really hard you can find something, but Republican criticism isn't a regular talking point. And it'd need to be a regular talking point in order for people to "remember, for a generation" job losses were caused by Republican policies.

[ Parent ]
Barbara Lee (D-CA) did this right now (4.00 / 2)
Now, we just need more!
[ Parent ]
Like they used to say (4.00 / 13)
during the first Republican Depression -- a Republican is someone who can't enjoy a good meal unless he knows someone somewhere is going hungry.

Too bad we had to learn that all over again the hard way.

Montani semper liberi

[ Parent ]
"The Second Republican Depression" (4.00 / 8)
Like the sound of that.
[ Parent ]
RIght (4.00 / 7)
But that would've happened whether O attracted zero of forty Republican votes.

Leadership is ownership.

Republicans are looking at 2010, hoping the economy doesn't turn around much before then.

What's the line again? Oh, yeah, they're rooting for America to fail.

[ Parent ]
The media takeaway I've heard so far is (4.00 / 5)
"Despite Obama coming up the Hill to meet the House Republicans, not a single one voted for the stimulus."

Good.  Seems to make them look like the morons they are.  Now of course, the thing has to work!

Question is... (4.00 / 3)
...will the media blame republicans for being obstructionists or will they blame obama for having "weak" influence?

I bet it's the latter!

REID: Voting against us was never part of our arrangement!
SPECTER: I am altering the deal! Pray I don't alter it any further!
REID: This deal keeps getting worse all the time!

[ Parent ]
Exactly why the outreach was a good idea (4.00 / 3)
There is little question in the public's mind that Obama was the one willing to work together for the greater good; the GOP looks petty.

It's a win.

[ Parent ]
Not on TV.... (4.00 / 1)
CNN and MSNBC smearing democrats full bore right now...

REID: Voting against us was never part of our arrangement!
SPECTER: I am altering the deal! Pray I don't alter it any further!
REID: This deal keeps getting worse all the time!
[ Parent ]
Nor on NPR this morning during my drive to work (0.00 / 0)
All they featured were two or three GOPpers complaining that for all Obama's rhetoric and showmanship, he really did not demonstrate any bi-partisanship and they had no choice but vote against the bill.

Obama and the Democrats have to change this nascent M$M message, which is laying the foundation for forcing even more "bi-partisan" concessions on the bill.

Its time for President O to take his case to the people and use his communicator skills to set the media agenda and frame the issue for the public.

Of course, it isn't all Obama's job. We all have a role in that as well.  

"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."

[ Parent ]
D grade in infrastucture (4.00 / 2)
http://www.asce.org/reportcard...

This was a small tidbit that I picked up by watching the vote on cspan.  we have a D grade in our infrastructure.  And republicans just voted against improving it.

Also I asked the question over at CongressMatters.

Why was the money for the lawn on the mall and family planning taken out?  To get no Republican votes?

You have been calling it a charade and I think this vote  makes that clear but unfortunately I do not see the pundits framing it that way.  I see them seeing this as a sign of the House caucus' strength.  I am hearing it now on MSNBC.

THis ties in a bit with A sirota post below

John Harwood said he spoke with a "democratic economist"  that wanted to see more tax cuts front loaded into the stimulus bill.  IS he #$@%ing kidding.  Who are these unnamed "democartic" operatives that seem to want to see more republican ideas in the bill?

Where were the Republicans when we needed them? (4.00 / 1)
If only they would have opposed giving trillions to the fat-cats, we might have had a chance to right the economic ship of state.

As it stands, we will get one more burst of phony growth just in time for the boomers to retire having totally gutted the economy.

Celebrate now, or do what you will, for the problem of an economy that consumes far more than it produces hasn't gone away, it has only gotten much worse,.

My prediction (4.00 / 5)
Obama will push the Dems to include even MORE tax cuts, all in the hopes of luring those elusive GOP voters. The stimulus bill gets weaker, we MAYBE get a handful of more GOP votes, and progressive causes such as infrastructure lose out.

I'm hoping this is not how it will turn out. I'm hoping Obama decides that the GOP is acting in bad faith and deserves to be ignored. I'm also hoping he realizes that his decision to offer a pre-compromised bill with $300 billion in tax cuts was a very bad negotiating strategy. It would have been better to offer a pure spending bill, then substituted in tax cuts after meeting with the GOP and hearing their concerns.

I just hope the Senate doesn't screw over infrastructure. The battle continues.

Better startegy? (4.00 / 4)
Better to cave under pressure rather than extend a olive branch from the start? Obama extended an olive branch, it was unanimously denied, now the Republicans can go Cheney themselves.

One thing that is interesting, Obama predicted the stimulus would grow, dramatically, in Congress. I think he even said $1.2 trillion. That hasn't happened, yet - seems like that particular component of his plan (to whatever degree he has a plan) hasn't panned out.  

"Don't hate the media, become the media" -Jello Biafra

[ Parent ]
Harwood predicted the same (4.00 / 2)
I'm hoping this is not how it will turn out. I'm hoping Obama decides that the GOP is acting in bad faith and deserves to be ignored. I'm also hoping he realizes that his decision to offer a pre-compromised bill with $300 billion in tax cuts was a very bad negotiating strategy. It would have been better to offer a pure spending bill, then substituted in tax cuts after meeting with the GOP and hearing their concerns.

Amen!

[ Parent ]
Obama (0.00 / 0)
Will just add the extra tax cuts to the existing package, so no one loses.. except the budget.
[ Parent ]
Disagree (0.00 / 0)
If anything should be added to the bill, its more infrastructure spending. The idea that cutting taxes for big business can stimulate the economy is the short term has been shown to be wrong. No need to keep doing the wrong thing, just to allow a bunch of nihilistic GOPpers to paint it as a victory in their re-election campaigns.


"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."
[ Parent ]
"Democrats" voting no (4.00 / 7)
..."Democrats" voting no: Allen Boyd (FL), Bobby Bright (AL), Jim Cooper (TN), Brad Ellsworth (IN), Parker Griffith (AL), Paul Kanjorski (PA), Frank Kratovil (MD), Walt Minnick (ID), Collin Peterson (MN), Heath Shuler (NC) and Gene Taylor (MS).  Honestly, seeing this rogue's gallery against the bill, I'm even more for it.

"Boehner Dogs"?

Insert shameless blog promotion here.

Bright (4.00 / 2)
What is the point of Bright?  His party unity score must be like 10% right now.

"Keep the Faith"
[ Parent ]
Minnick is even worse (4.00 / 2)
Progressive Punch scores:

Heath Shuler - 75.51% (although 55% this year)
Park Griffith - 65.22%
Collin Peterson - 61.06%
Taylor - 53.73%
Bright - 48.8%
Minnick - 39.13 %

The most "progressive" Republican is Chris Smith at 23.28%.

Even the Blue Dogs are better than the best Republican, but still...the most fringe Republican still votes with his party 76% of the time, compared to 39% for the most fringe Democrat. There are 29 Democrats less loyal to the party than Chris Smith and Ron Paul are to the GOP.

[ Parent ]
Heath is a real disappointment (4.00 / 1)
I know many people that worked towards his election the first time.
 Working Families Win did a lot of work there in North Carolina for Schuler and Kissel in 2006.  
 Heath was suppose to be in support of working families.
 I don't know he is much better than the Republican he replaced.  
 If Charlie Taylor had not skipped the CAFTA vote he probably would have won and given what we have may not have been a bad thing.
A more progressive Dem might have run in 2008.
[ Parent ]
Why did Kanjorski vote against it? .. (0.00 / 0)
the others don't surprise me at all .. just Kanjorski
[ Parent ]
Griffeth was just on Lou Dobs smearing Democrats... n/t (4.00 / 1)


REID: Voting against us was never part of our arrangement!
SPECTER: I am altering the deal! Pray I don't alter it any further!
REID: This deal keeps getting worse all the time!
[ Parent ]
idiot (4.00 / 4)
I wish more members of the Progressive caucus would go on these TV shows. It was fantastic seeing DeFazio on Rachel Maddow, we just need to get more liberals on the TV.
[ Parent ]
Sounds like him (0.00 / 0)
It would suck to be a Democrat in Alabama.  

John McCain: Beacuse lobbyists should have more power
[ Parent ]
Boehner Dogs (0.00 / 0)
is a good name. But doesn't really have a good public sound like Bush Dogs did.

Hoover Dogs?

Depression Dogs?

Kratovil and Minnick have tough districts, so it can be excused to an extent. Shuler is looking at potentially running for Senate, if he does they he needs to to get crushed in the primary.

Two main targets to focus on: Obama won Jim Cooper's district by 13. Obama won Kanjorski's district by 15. They've got some explaining to do if they don't want to face serious and well funded primary challengers.

Also worth noting. Childers and Minnick voted for the Republican plan. Cao voted against the final stimulus plan (guess he knows he's a one termer!)  

John McCain: Beacuse lobbyists should have more power

[ Parent ]
Kanjorski might actually be out on the left on this one (0.00 / 0)
Kanjorski was calling for more funding a few days back, according to a quick hit. It was pretty incoherent and he's always been fairly conservative and fairly irritating, but it might just be possible that he's pulling a Kucinich here.

Forgotten Countries - a foreign policy-focused blog
[ Parent ]
Rahm & Schumer Dogs (0.00 / 0)
that's what they are.
[ Parent ]
Rahm and Schumer (4.00 / 2)
have been working their tail off for this. Their job is to get anyone with a D by their name elected and almost all of those people voted the right way. The two biggest offenders are in safe districts and the DCCC had little or no role in getting them elected.  

John McCain: Beacuse lobbyists should have more power
[ Parent ]
Boehner-heads. Just say it fast. (4.00 / 1)

[ Parent ]
It's weird who objected when (4.00 / 3)
Childers and Minnick voted for the Camp amendment (thereby rather thwarting the arguments of those who claimed Childers as an economic populist) but only Minnick was against the stimulus as a whole.

Arcuri, Altmire, Donnelly, Ellsworth and Melancon all voted to recommit, but ended up supporting the stimulus. Did they have amendments that were rejected? I know that Arcuri had a close re-election and the modus operandi of the other four is triangulation, but I was wondering if there was another reason.

Also, fuck Walt Minnick. It's hard to make an argument for Bobby Bright, especially when a couple of million sent to AL-3 would have given us a Democrat instead, but there's even less reason to be thankful for Minnick. We got rid of Bill Sali, who was an insane fucker we could use as a poster child for why Republicans shouldn't be trusted, and replaced him with the second coming of Jamie Whitten.

I would further suggest that Collin Peterson should have the Agriculture chairmanship taken away from him for persistent dickheadery, and that Parker Griffith should be told to get in line or funding to his district will be cut off and he'll be out on his ear, but those are secondary (and poosibly unwisely vindictive) issues. Mostly, fuck Walt Minnick.

Forgotten Countries - a foreign policy-focused blog

[ Parent ]
Ellsworth (4.00 / 1)
Is listed by the Washington Post as voting against the stimulus.  No Democratic woman voted against the package.  All 11 were men. Loretta Sanchez changed at the last instant.
[ Parent ]
Ellsworth is my mistake (0.00 / 0)
Congress Matters were saying that Loretta Sanchez's yes for most of the vote was due to an error in the voting system.

Forgotten Countries - a foreign policy-focused blog
[ Parent ]
Mmmph (0.00 / 0)
I'd rather see them against the wall -- metaphorically speaking, of course.
[ Parent ]
Enough of this post-partisan bull shit. (4.00 / 6)
Its time to rain down hell file on the the people who crashed the economy
As expected... (4.00 / 1)
The talking heads ont eh TV are smearing Democrats.  Mathews, especially, is going off on the contraceptive funding that was taken out... Thanks Obama... by, including Republicans, you hurt us all...

REID: Voting against us was never part of our arrangement!
SPECTER: I am altering the deal! Pray I don't alter it any further!
REID: This deal keeps getting worse all the time!
Thanks for watching that stuff... (4.00 / 6)

 ...so I don't have to.

 I refuse to waste rods and cones and cochleas on TV "news".

 If Obama's smart, he pushes media reform and breaks up the "news" conglomerates.

 The mediots can then regurgitate one last hairball of Republican spin as they melt away like the Wicked Witch of the West.  

"We judge ourselves by our ideals; others by their actions. It is a great convenience." -- Howard Zinn

[ Parent ]
this makes Republicans look worse (4.00 / 2)
Obama was very gracious and then they all went against it. This makes Obama look good and Republicans look like bad faith actors. Republicans look petty right now in a way they wouldn't look had Obama not been so "bipartisan."
Media is going after Obama and dems... (4.00 / 2)
...by including Republicans, it increased their stature, as if they were somehow important... now, their issues gain credibility....  it's going to turn out to be a colossal mistake!

REID: Voting against us was never part of our arrangement!
SPECTER: I am altering the deal! Pray I don't alter it any further!
REID: This deal keeps getting worse all the time!
[ Parent ]
the only mistake (4.00 / 2)
is if the stimulus doesn't create jobs. Dems will have to take responsibility anyway. If the Dems are smart, they put even more job-creating infrastructure into the bill since the GOP won't go along anyway.
[ Parent ]
agreed (4.00 / 1)
i want to see more infrastructure. Dorgan was on 1600 Penn. ave. saying that more would be put in by the Senate. Hopefully, they put enough in there to make it a cool trillion. Everyone's calling it a trillion dollar plan; it might as well actually be a trillion dollars. Besides that, I'm fine with the plan.
[ Parent ]
even the GOP (4.00 / 4)
can't oppose real infrastructure spending and expect to remain popular. I know, there are GOP yahoos who want to eliminate all spending and defund AMTRAK, etc. But their constituents want better roads, better schools, less traffic, and more jobs. Infrastructure is the one type of spending that GOP cannot criticize without hurting themselves.
[ Parent ]
sdf (4.00 / 1)
negative things are said on cable news all the time. you would be well advised not to draw conclusions from that.
[ Parent ]
No Republicans At All--Obama's Double Secret Plan? (4.00 / 6)
Could be.

It's pretty impressive, even if there was one not voting.

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3

I don't know if you're being snarky, or not (0.00 / 0)
But, if this is part of some kind of plan, the WH and the Congressional Dems better get to work changing the M$M spin on the vote, 'cause right now its looking like the RW noise machine is running at full tilt and painting this as failure of Obama to follow through on his campaign promises of bi-partisanship.


"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."
[ Parent ]
can we make it better now (4.00 / 4)
so can this bill be made better now?
the House version was as better as it was ever gonna get, sadly -- (4.00 / 1)
now it just gets weakened further in the Senate.
[ Parent ]
Makes sense, assuming you think the stimulus can work (4.00 / 1)
Chris, I think your position makes perfect sense if you assume a "passable" stimulus will work.  However, there is a growing movement of economists and business leaders who think that $800-$900B just isn't going to do it.  I tend to agree with them.

Let's pretend Obama doesn't think he can pass an effective stimulus -- say a target he believes to be in the $1.5-2T range -- or worse, if he doesn't believe it will work at all.  He may still want to pass something helpful that stimulates in the short-term and follows up on his campaign promises.   If this were the case, hedging against the "passable" stimulus proving weak or ineffective is good strategy.

Getting bipartisan support is probably the best way to hedge against this outcome, politically, even though Democrats would still end up with a majority of the blame.  Sharing the blame with 20 republicans brought on-board via $300B in tax-cuts may be a small cost if you think there's a reasonable chance that the stimulus will be ineffective.

Just some food for thought...

Well, its time to improve the stimulus as much as possible (4.00 / 3)
while still avoiding a filibuster in the Senate.

We also know whose opinion doesn't need to be sought when the inevitable second round of the stimulus needs to be funded.

I figured it would end up this way, but it was worth a try. If nothing else, Obama won some additional good will among the population and has something to point to as a reason not to seek Republican input in the future.

"Never separate the life you live from the words you speak" -Paul Wellstone

Why avoid a filibuster? (4.00 / 4)
Do a real filibuster.  All night all day.  All night all day.  And just keep doing it until the stop.  Then let it be all R's and CFL's against.  And pass it.
[ Parent ]
Its a matter of time. We want this thing passed (0.00 / 0)
We needed this bill 2 months ago.

In principle, a truly determined minority of Senators, even one too small to prevent cloture, usually can delay for as much as two weeks the time at which the
Senate finally votes to pass a bill that most Senators support. Table 1 summarizes a hypothetical example. In this example, a motion to proceed to the bill's consideration is made on a Monday (Day 1). If a filibuster on that motion is begun or is anticipated, proponents of the motion and the bill can present a cloture motion on the same day. However, under Rule XXII, the cloture vote on the motion to proceed does not take place until Wednesday (Day 3). Assuming the Senate invokes cloture on Wednesday, there then begins the 30-hour period for post-cloture consideration of the motion. If the Senate is in session for eight hours per day,
Monday through Friday, the 30-hour period, if fully consumed, will extend over almost four full days of session, or at least until the end of the Senate's session on the following Monday (Day 6). If, at that time, the Senate votes for the motion to proceed, the bill's opponents then may begin to filibuster the bill itself, requiring another cloture motion, another successful cloture vote (on Day 8), and the expiration of another 30-hour period for post-cloture consideration. Under these conditions, Rule XXII would require that the vote on final passage occur on the 11th day of consideration, or the 15th calendar day after the motion to proceed was made.

http://www.senate.gov/referenc...

Thus even if Dems could win cloture votes immediately, some idiot like Vitter or Coburn or Cornyn could delay the bill and Senate business for 2 weeks. Now if the Dems can't get 60 votes to win cloture, it could go even longer, holding up the stimulus and other Senate business.

"Never separate the life you live from the words you speak" -Paul Wellstone

[ Parent ]
Develop working relationships with 6 or so Rs in the senate (4.00 / 5)
and we're good to go.  We can leave the Republican House to self-destruct.  Maybe we'll actually start to see some moderate, pragmatic republicans start to emerge in the states.

Let's make it more progressive now (4.00 / 1)
The bi-partisan charade is over.  Hopefully the Senate replaces the tax cuts with more investment in rail, and puts the family provision back in.  There's no appeasing the Republican dittoheads in Congress.  It's time to ignore them.  R.I.P. Post-partisanship, and welcome to the reality based community, Obama.
Krugman's snark (4.00 / 1)
Here: http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.c...

Zero lower bound
The House has passed the stimulus bill with not a single Republican vote.

Aren't you glad that Obama watered it down and added ineffective tax cuts, so as to win bipartisan support?

Stimulus Passes House With Zero Republican Votes | 66 comments
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