Blog

When Congress created the deficit supercommittee they attached a trigger to it that would automatically enact large cuts in defense spending if they failed to vote out a proposal. The idea was that nobody in Congress wants to make major cuts to defense so the threat would compel the supercommittee to accomplish the kind of deficit-reduction compromise that the full House and Senate were unable to achieve. More than halfway through the supercommittee's tenure, however, the only progress being made involves finding a way out of the trigger.

If there's one bill in Congress that pits people of all political stripes against big corporations and the politicians they fund, S.978 is it. The bill would make web streaming of copyrighted content a felony with a prison sentence of up to 5 years. That means you could go to jail for posting a video to YouTube with the wrong background music, all in the name of protecting big media companies that don't want to update their old business models for the age of peer-to-peer sharing.

Republicans and Democrats in the House are throwing their support behind a bill to let federal contractors retain more of their payments up front. They're planning to pay for it by scaling back federal health care subsidies for the poor and middle class.

Following up on last week's symbolic vote on Obama's jobs bill, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid [D, NV] has decided on the next step. He's whittling the $447 billion down to a single, fully-offset $35 billion spending measure that would provide state and local aid to public employees facing layoffs. He's planning to bring it up for a vote in the Senate later this week. 

Under current law, no country can receive more than 7% of the total employment-based immigration visas made available worldwide. The cap ensures diversity in the employment-based immigration community, but it also means that workers in big countries, like India and China, who American tech firms might want to hire, have very little chance of actually securing a visa.

The House Judiciary Committee this afternoon is holding a mark-up of the first major immigration reform bill of this session, and it's designed to address this issue. The"Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act," introduced recently by Rep. Jason Chaffetz [R, UT-3], would remove the per-country immigration caps to make it easier for U.S. companies to hire foreign workers.

The House is taking a break from working on jobs, the economy, and other dull stuff like that so they can vote on an important issue that the people actually care about -- abortion. The Repubilcan leadership has scheduled a vote this afternoon on the "Protect Life Act," which would allow hospitals to deny abortion services even if it means the mother will die. Finally! HuffPo:

The House is scheduled to vote this week on a new bill that would allow federally-funded hospitals that oppose abortions to refuse to perform the procedure, even in cases where a woman would die without it.

Under current law, every hospital that receives Medicare or Medicaid money is legally required to provide emergency care to any patient in need, regardless of his or her financial situation. If a hospital is unable to provide what the patient needs -- including a life-saving abortion -- it has to transfer the patient to a hospital that can.

The AP has a helpful post up explaining the details of the bill to provide aid to workers who get their jobs shipped overseas that Congress thought would be wise to pass before approving these new free trade deals. They're comparing it to an expansion of the measures that were enacted in 2009 as part of the stimulus bill and expired in February.

President Obama didn't send the American Jobs Act of 2011 to Congress because he thought it would pass and help boost the economy. He knew it would fail, but he wanted to use its failure to back up a talking point for his re-election. The Republicans are blocking the Democrats from passing their job-creation plan, the argument would go. Last night, by a vote of 50-49, Obama got his talking point.

The American Jobs Act contains a provision that would be extremely stimulative in terms of GDP expansion and jobs growth while also providing direct relief to the workers who have been hardest hit by the recession. Yet in discussions over which parts of the bill to keep for inclusion in a smaller, bipartisan package after the American Jobs Act is officially killed, that provision doesn't seem to be popular.

Some big items on the agenda this week, including the first and only vote Obama's jobs bill, the American Jobs Act of 2011, is likely to get. The bill was tweaked last week to get more Democrats on board by switching the revenue section from a collection of tax-loophole closers to a 5.6% tax increase on income earned above $1 million. The change is expected to bring the Democrats in favor to about 47, short of both the 60 that would be needed to break a Republican filibuster and the 51 that would be needed to actually pass it.

All week Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid [D, NV] and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell [R, KY] have been in a procedural battle over the American Jobs Act. McConnell has been trying to force a vote on the bill in the form of an amendment to the China currency bill that is currently before the Senate in order to show that the Democrats don't even have their own caucus in order on it. Reid says he's willing to vote on the jobs bill, but not in the form of an amendment. He offered to move from the China currency bill to the jobs bill so the Senate can have a full debate and he can offer amendments to help shore up the Democrats. McConnell rejected the offer.

On Thursday afternoon it appeared that McConnell was going to win, sort of. He was planning to force a vote on a motion to suspend the Senate rules that require amendments to be germane and move to his amendment (i.e. the jobs bill). It wouldn't be a vote on the jobs bill, but it would be a vote on voting on the jobs bill, and in his mind that would be enough for justify good talking points.The Senate Parliamentarian determined that McConnell's move was legit and ruled it in order. That's when Reid pulled out the "nuclear option":

As big, taxpayer-supported banks jack up fees on their customers, Rep. Brad Miller [D, NC-13] has introduced legislation to ensure that customers can easily close their accounts and mover their money elsewhere. The bill, titled the Freedom and Mobility in Mobile Banking Act, would require banks to allow customers to close their accounts at any time and help them transfer their direct deposits and automatic bill-pay settings to a new bank.

At this point there are basically two conceivable ways for Obama and the congressional Democrats to get their jobs bill, the American Jobs Act, through Congress this year. They could cut it down dramatically to things that could potentially get bipartisan support, like the payroll tax holiday and the unpaid job training program for the unemployed, or they could go hardball and threaten to withhold appropriations and shut down the government. This morning, Majority Leader Harry Reid [D, NV] (pictured) announced what he intends to do. He's going with none of the above, choosing the purely political option instead.

The Senate is currently making progress on bipartisan legislation designed to shrink the U.S. trade deficit with China and restore up to 2.8 million domestic manufacturing positions. Yesterday, a majority of both Democrats and Republicans in the Senate voted to invoke cloture on the China trade bill, a.k.a. the Currency Exchange Rate Oversight Reform Act, and they're expected to pass it by the end of the week. But that will be the end of the line for the bill.

Last week I wrote about how the deficit supercommittee has so far held the majority of its meetings in complete secrecy. Well, as it turns out, that's not exactly true. According to Politico, the committee members have choosen a select group of citizens to give special access to their private meetings to. You and I just happen to not be on the list.