Unlike lightning, Senator Barbara Boxer can strike twice in the same place, and on the same day. In two separate speeches on the Senate floor this Friday, Senator Boxer took down Rand Paul and the Senate GOP for fighting like hell to STOP a bill moving through Congress that might help America's unemployment crisis. Senator Boxer called out the GOP for creating this disaster under George W. Bush and got in a nice shot at History Professor Sarah Palin. Taking a page from the Bernie Sanders playbook, Senator Boxer gave the GOP hell.
On an aside note, I think my job interview yesterday did not go well. This is massively frustrating. I am spending all day today, again, sending out resumes. I just want a damn job. Rent is due again soon and I am starting to panic, so, though I am not proud to do so, I am asking for help.
Anyone who would like to help and support my job hunting and writing can make a donation to me with paypal.
In return for your support, I will gladly send you a copy of my new book as soon as I am able. Any help given will be much appreciated.
Now, on to the show . . .
Senator Boxer: "Now we're going through a time where we have to cut spending, and I love when the Republicans lecture Democrats about it! Watch, wait till you hear what goes on here. Guess the only party to ever balance the budget and create a surplus? The Democrats, under Bill Clinton, in recent memory. So don't lecture us about how to balance budgets, we know how to do it, and guess what, we know how to do it by creating 23 million jobs, so I don't need to hear the lectures, because they're misplaced. Talk to yourselves. You're the ones who didn't say a word when George Bush gave a tax cut to billionaires and put it all on the credit card, and now you still want to extend those tax cuts and bleed the revenues."
Senate President: "Will you yield for a question?"
Senator Boxer: "You're the . . . I will not yield until I'm finished. I've stated that before.
But thank you for asking.
So here we are. I have to reiterate so I don't lose my place. Under Bill Clinton, the Democrats balanced the budget, created the surpluses and 23 million jobs. George Bush came over, he held a press conference, I saw it last night. He said, "We don't need surpluses. This money belongs to the American people." and he didn't say what he meant, he meant it belongs to rich people, super rich people who earn over a billion and a million dollars, he gave away the store, then he went to war, two wars, and he put it on the credit card, and my friends on the other side never once said "Gee, I can't raise the debt ceiling to pay the debts." They all voted to pay, almost to a person, raise the debt ceiling, when it was doubled from Bill Clinton. But now, after George Bush left a mess, a god awful mess in the debt and the deficit, he handed President Obama a 1.2 trillion dollar deficit, and all of a sudden they blame President Obama for all of this. The American people get it, they don't buy it, they understand it. They're not happy where we are, and they shouldn't be, but they know where the problem started. Do you know why? Cause you can't re-write history! Well, you could try. But those deficits and those debts, those numbers, they're in the books, and unless you erase them they'll remain in the books. I don't care whether it's talking about Paul Revere's ride or the deficits, that's history. So I'll show you the deficits we had when we were in control, we got it down to zero, and we got surpluses and 23 million jobs, and that all was erased, and then we entered a situation, the last couple of years of the Bush Administration, where jobs were bleeding at 800,000 a month, 700,000 a month, credit was frozen, the automobile industry was in the tank, and President Obama took action. And this recovery is tough, the worst recession since the Great Depression. So this is what I know we can do if we work together, dare I say it, we can adopt a framework that understands billionaires and millionaires don't need their tax cuts now, we can get some more revenues in here, and cut the fat, and cut the duplication, and go after the people who don't pay the taxes they owe, and end the war in Afghanistan and save a trillion over ten years. I can come up with 4 trillion dollars pretty easily! Allow Medicare to negotiate with the drug companies for lower prices! How's that? 200 Billion!
But no, instead, there's demagoguery. And there's attempts to bring down bills like this, clean, nice bills that would do everything we know we need to do now, leverage our spare dollars, attract public investment, create jobs! No. We're facing a host of amendments, and I don't find it funny, I find it sad that we can not come together."
Republicans can have their dimbulbs in Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann and keep them. Californians are lucky to have an eloquent, smart Senator in Barbara Boxer, and if you weren't aware of how awesome she is, or if you know already, watch Senator Boxer calmly demolish the GOP AGAIN on the Senate floor.
The video with transcript and more is below the fold
This week, as they did last week the Senate has been debating a JOBS bill. Surely you've seen it all over the news. /snark.
In order to try to move this bill forward, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) decided to allow Republican Senators to make amendments to the bill. Of course, Senate Republicans decided to turn this simple jobs bill into a mockery. They have NO IDEAS on how to create jobs, outside of the plan to do everything George W. Bush did harder and better. So Senate Republicans decided to use their amendments to this JOBS bill to try and repeal Wall Street Reform. As ThinkProgress.org reported . . .
One amendment filed by tea-party Sen. Jim DeMint (R., S.C.) would repeal the whole financial law *(Dodd-Frank)…Meanwhile, Sen. Jerry Moran (R, Kan.) has filed an amendment that would replace the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau — a centerpiece of Dodd-Frank that would have broad powers over the financial industry — with a six-person board…A third amendment, filed by Sen. David Vitter (R, La.) would repeal parts of the Dodd-Frank law that give a council of regulators, known as the Financial Stability Oversight Council, the authority to decide if a company is “too big to fail.”
*Added by the diarist
Senator Jim DeMint's amendment was pretty straight forward: END WALL ST REFORM!, but as ThinkProgress explains, the more clever deviousness is to be found in the Moran and Vitter amendments.
The amendments suggested by Moran and Vitter are right in line with other GOP efforts to weaken Dodd-Frank. Moran’s amendment would turn the CFPB into an ineffective commission, rather than the strong independent regulator consumers need and deserve, while Vitter’s would prevent regulators from forcing the nation’s biggest banks into abiding by heightened regulations.
At one point Senator Rand Paul stood up and asked to add an amendment that would raise the national debt ceiling, but then he expressed his intention to vote against his own amendment, and at that point, California Senator Barbara Boxer had just about enough and got up and called Rand Paul and his colleagues out on their time wasting sham and their role in creating the deficit and jobs disaster we face today. Raking over the coals sounds appropriate.
Senator Rand Paul: "I ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending amendment and call up amendment #414."
Presiding Senate President: "Without objection, the clerk will report."
Clerk: "The Senator from Kentucky, Mr. Paul, proposes amendment #414. At the appropriate place, insert the following . . ."
Senator Rand Paul: "This amendment will raise the debt ceiling $2.4 Trillion dollars, this will comply with the President's budget. Uh, Many on the other side have have asked for a clean vote on raising the debt ceiling, and because I really want to get along and go along I want to make this vote available for those who'd like to raise the debt ceiling. Uh, I will vote no, but I wanted to do this in consideration Of the majorities wishes. Thank you."
Presiding Senate President: "The Senator from California."
Senator Barbara Boxer: "Mr. President. Let the games begin. That's what's going on around here. I have full respect for my colleagues, and you can tell by the tone and tenor of Senator Paul that he, he finds it amusing that he's offering a clean debt ceiling increase that he's voting against. He's offering an amendment that he's voting against, when we know we're in discussions with the President, in discussions with the Vice President, in discussions with the gang of six to try and figure out a way that we can come together, not have gotcha votes on the United States Senate floor. It's outrageous. I'll tell you why it's outrageous, we have an underlying bill here, Mr. President, that you've been very helpful with, S.782, the Economic Development Revitalization Act of 2011, which will reauthorize a very important program that's been in place in this country, in this great nation, since 1965. That was last passed when George W. Bush was President, that passed this Senate unanimously, without all these amendments that are going nowhere, I mean, there is 27 amendments as of last night (Thursday, Jun 9th), actually, there's probably many more now. And we know this game, because we played it once before when Senator Landrieu (D-LA) stood where I'm standing now and tried to get a small business bill through here, which would have created thousands of jobs in this nation. Well, here we are, we have a bill that came out of the committee I am fortunate enough to chair, Environment and Public Works, with a strong vote, we had one dissent. Senator Inhofe (R-OK) is my primary co-sponsor.
For 50 years, this EDA program, the Economic Development Administration, has created jobs, spurred growth in economically hard hit communities. We know this struggle we're having, coming out of this greatest recession since the Great Depression, and I want to remind the people within the sound of my voice that when President Obama took over this country was bleeding almost a million jobs a month. . ."
Moar of this, puhleeze.
This is not a yelling match. There is no raised voice coming from Senator Boxer. No, this is a better kind of smackdown, a controlled, steady demolishing of GOP tactics and lies.
And, honestly, we HAVE seen this before, this is coming straight out of the "Delay Health Care Reform At All Costs" playbook of 2009 when Republicans offered amendment after meaningless amendment in order to run out the clock, and then, even when their amendments passed and got included in the final bill, Republicans still voted against the whole bill anyway. The difference between then and now is that the Senate did not include teabaggers like Rand Paul who are too stupid to realize that you are not supposed to say you are going to vote against your own amendment while you are offering it up for consideration, because that ruins the whole delay tactic and makes it clearly obvious that you are not negotiating in good faith. Kudos to Senator Boxer for laughing in his face and calling Rand Paul and other Republicans out on their naked duplicity.
And more kudos for showing us that YES Democratic Women CAN kick some major ass.
The bill in question isn't even that big of a bill, as far as job creation measures go it is tepid at best, but better than nothing. The issue is over the authorization of funding for the Economic Development Administration (EDA). Senate Dems want to increase the budget of the EDA, Republicans want to end it and use that money to justify greater tax cuts for the super rich, and, barring that, the GOP will gladly hijack this bill and turn it into a repeal of Wall Street reform, because we all know that if there is one thing Wall Street doesn't need after the collapse at the end of the Bush Presidency, it is reform.
Of course, the Republicans have no shame. Part of that is due to the fact that the media simply refuses to inform the public of how damaging the "Ideas" currently being floated by the GOP would be to the average working class American, but another part of that is due to the fact that elected Democrats are often just unwilling, it seems, to fight the GOP head on. More often than not, it seems Democrats would rather just get along than kick up a fuss over the total dismantling if the working class as the GOP has proposed it with their policy initiatives.
Simply put, if Democrats STILL refuse to fight back against the GOP I don't see how they can win. And I mean ALL Democrats, from the President on down.
You can NOT win unless you fight, and it has been too damn long since President Obama and Democrats decided to take a strong stand against the GOP war on working people. It is time to pick a fight.
Because, at the end of the day, we can not win if we don't even try to fight against the lies and policies that harm the working class and profit only the rich. Cheers to Senator Barbara Boxer for being that fighter. She didn't have to yell or shout to get it done, and, though it is just one small battle and not the war itself, if anything, this is what a Smackdown with Class looks like.
As I said before, Moar of this Puhleeze.
Peace and love to one and all
You can purchase your copy of "Americana: By Jesse LaGreca" by making a contribution of your choice to me with Paypal
You can follow me on Twitter @JesseLaGreca