Harry Reid (D? NV) Screws Up Again, This Time on Housing
Nominal Democrat, Senator Harry Reid needs to step down as Senate Majority leader.
As I wrote in early February, he screwed up the FISA bill: "Reid brought to the Senate floor the Senate Intelligence Committee's (chaired by Jay Rockefeller, so called Democrat, from West Virginia who is in the pocket of telecoms) bill, that granted retroactive immunity to telecoms and other Bush demands as the base bill rather than the Senate Judiciary Committee's bill which did not and provided stronger oversight requirements.
"The Senate Majority Leader also refused to honor the hold placed on the flawed FISA bill by fellow Democrat Senator Chris Dodd, even though he previously honored holds, even egregious ones, placed by GOP senators!
Now he's done it again with the Senate Housing Bill.
According to the Washington Post, "
"Senate Democratic and Republican leaders rushing to address the nation's housing crisis reached agreement yesterday on a package that would provide billions of dollars in tax rebates to the slumping home-building industry while offering little to homeowners threatened with foreclosure.
"After working through Tuesday night to flesh out a bipartisan agreement, lawmakers unveiled a bill that rejects the most ambitious plans for aiding distressed homeowners, including a Democratic proposal to permit bankruptcy judges to modify the mortgage on a person's primary residence.
" 'It's not clear what good it's really doing,' said Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. 'It's a bipartisan effort not to help the right people.' "
Ain't that the truth.
And yet, clueless, bumbling Harry "lauded the agreement as 'a robust package' that is 'good news for the American people.' " What planet is he on?
Other Democratic senators were not so sanguine.
As the Post article continues,
"But the lead negotiators on the deal, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) and the panel's ranking Republican, Sen. Richard C. Shelby (Ala.), acknowledged that the legislation does not go as far as either side would like and represents only their first attempt at helping to resolve the nation's housing problems."
No kidding!
Matthew Rothschild at The Progressive offers on target details:
"Reid, with his usual spinelessness, opted to strip the bankruptcy revision from the compromise bill, so Durbin had to offer it up as an amendment, which doomed it late Thursday. It failed, 58-36, with 10 Democrats and one Independent siding with the Republicans and the banking industry.
"They were:
Mark Pryor from Arkansas
"And, of course, Joe Lieberman of Connecticut.
“The provision I offered was narrowly tailored and provided real help to more than half a million American homeowners facing foreclosure,” Durbin said.
“Unfortunately, my amendment was strenuously opposed by the banking lobby and their powerful friends in the Bush Administration and in the Senate.”
"Consumer groups were also unhappy.
"Meanwhile, one regressive proposal may just fly. And that’s to give people a $7,000 tax credit if they buy a foreclosed home.
"So the vultures who swoop down and grab the home from some poor schlub who took out a sub-prime mortgage could get $7,000 from the government, but that poor schlub couldn’t get seven grand from the government to keep out of foreclosure.
"It’s also a subsidy to the well-to-do who can afford to go buy a home right now.
“ 'If the federal government is going to ride to the rescue of investment banks on Wall Street, it should also provide some relief to those who are about to lose their homes on Main Street,' Senator Durbin said. 'Our goal ought to be preventing foreclosures, not just propping up home builders and big lenders.' ”
"The class bias in the housing market is once more encased in law."
And that's how the Senate really works: lobbyists and contributions first, the common good and working people, last and not so much.
(If I read or hear Claire McGaskill's name mentioned again as Democratic VP material, I'll barf. She's not, by a long shot, and never going will be and this vote is more evidence against her. I'm also disappointed in Jon Tester on this.)
(On another note: besides Harry Reid being incompetent and spineless, he reminds me of a male version of Mrs. Landingham, President Bartlett's original secretary on "The West Wing": same facial features, the same kind of whiny voice and milquetoast demeanor.)
As I wrote in early February, he screwed up the FISA bill: "Reid brought to the Senate floor the Senate Intelligence Committee's (chaired by Jay Rockefeller, so called Democrat, from West Virginia who is in the pocket of telecoms) bill, that granted retroactive immunity to telecoms and other Bush demands as the base bill rather than the Senate Judiciary Committee's bill which did not and provided stronger oversight requirements.
"The Senate Majority Leader also refused to honor the hold placed on the flawed FISA bill by fellow Democrat Senator Chris Dodd, even though he previously honored holds, even egregious ones, placed by GOP senators!
Now he's done it again with the Senate Housing Bill.
According to the Washington Post, "
"Senate Democratic and Republican leaders rushing to address the nation's housing crisis reached agreement yesterday on a package that would provide billions of dollars in tax rebates to the slumping home-building industry while offering little to homeowners threatened with foreclosure.
"After working through Tuesday night to flesh out a bipartisan agreement, lawmakers unveiled a bill that rejects the most ambitious plans for aiding distressed homeowners, including a Democratic proposal to permit bankruptcy judges to modify the mortgage on a person's primary residence.
" 'It's not clear what good it's really doing,' said Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. 'It's a bipartisan effort not to help the right people.' "
Ain't that the truth.
And yet, clueless, bumbling Harry "lauded the agreement as 'a robust package' that is 'good news for the American people.' " What planet is he on?
Other Democratic senators were not so sanguine.
As the Post article continues,
"But the lead negotiators on the deal, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) and the panel's ranking Republican, Sen. Richard C. Shelby (Ala.), acknowledged that the legislation does not go as far as either side would like and represents only their first attempt at helping to resolve the nation's housing problems."
No kidding!
Matthew Rothschild at The Progressive offers on target details:
"Reid, with his usual spinelessness, opted to strip the bankruptcy revision from the compromise bill, so Durbin had to offer it up as an amendment, which doomed it late Thursday. It failed, 58-36, with 10 Democrats and one Independent siding with the Republicans and the banking industry.
"They were:
Mark Pryor from Arkansas
Blanche Lincoln from Arkansas
Tom Carper of Delaware
Mary Landrieu of Louisiana
Claire McCaskill of Missouri
Max Baucus of Montana
Jon Tester of Montana
Ben Nelson of Nebraska
Tim Johnson of South Dakota
Robert Byrd of West Virginia
"And, of course, Joe Lieberman of Connecticut.
“The provision I offered was narrowly tailored and provided real help to more than half a million American homeowners facing foreclosure,” Durbin said.
“Unfortunately, my amendment was strenuously opposed by the banking lobby and their powerful friends in the Bush Administration and in the Senate.”
"Consumer groups were also unhappy.
"Meanwhile, one regressive proposal may just fly. And that’s to give people a $7,000 tax credit if they buy a foreclosed home.
"So the vultures who swoop down and grab the home from some poor schlub who took out a sub-prime mortgage could get $7,000 from the government, but that poor schlub couldn’t get seven grand from the government to keep out of foreclosure.
"It’s also a subsidy to the well-to-do who can afford to go buy a home right now.
“ 'If the federal government is going to ride to the rescue of investment banks on Wall Street, it should also provide some relief to those who are about to lose their homes on Main Street,' Senator Durbin said. 'Our goal ought to be preventing foreclosures, not just propping up home builders and big lenders.' ”
"The class bias in the housing market is once more encased in law."
And that's how the Senate really works: lobbyists and contributions first, the common good and working people, last and not so much.
(If I read or hear Claire McGaskill's name mentioned again as Democratic VP material, I'll barf. She's not, by a long shot, and never going will be and this vote is more evidence against her. I'm also disappointed in Jon Tester on this.)
(On another note: besides Harry Reid being incompetent and spineless, he reminds me of a male version of Mrs. Landingham, President Bartlett's original secretary on "The West Wing": same facial features, the same kind of whiny voice and milquetoast demeanor.)
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