So the good news is, I got the extension. The bad news is, I don’t know when I’ll get it – me, and two million other Americans:
(CNN) — Extended unemployment benefits will temporarily expire for thousands of Americans on Monday because the Senate went on its spring recess without approving a one-month deadline extension.
The extension, which had bipartisan support, would have cost about $10 billion, but a lone Republican, Sen. Tom Coburn, said no until the costs are offset.
The Oklahoma senator objected to a commonly used unanimous-consent agreement to pass the bill under emergency conditions, even if it increases the federal deficit. Coburn wants to eliminate additional government spending to pay for the bill.
“The legitimate debate is whether we borrow and steal from our kids or we get out of town and send the bill to our kids for something that we’re going to consume today,” Coburn said on the Senate floor.
It’s the second time a Republican has blocked a so-called “emergency extension” of jobless benefits.
The last time this happened was in 2002, when the economy was in the crapper after 9/11. No one could quite believe that the Republicans refused to extend unemployment benefits, but they did. As a result, I ended up leaving my apartment right before I was going to be evicted.
This isn’t a game, although Republicans would like to have you believe we’re all just sitting around on vacation, sipping pina coladas. Shame on them.
Hey Susie, I can see you now: you’re partying on a sun-drenched, sandy beach in Barbados, a delightful pina colada in hand, kicked back under the umbrella writing blogs; and there you are complaining about your unemployment check being held up by some idiot in the Senate who has no clue whatsoever about the deleterious impact of his stupidity on you and millions of his fellow Americans. Ain’t America great?
As proof they aren’t totally stupid, Republicans sometimes depict class war as generational war, selfish boomer geezers versus the innocent young, just starting out and trying to build a life.
But it’s a lot easier in the cases of Social Security and Medicare.
I won’t know if I’m amongst the 2(4?)00,000 ’till Wed as now on a Fed Ext I can no longer access claim info on-line.
On a lighter note, there was one job in the local paper yesterday. No, not one job I’m uniquely qualified or even one job I would do out of desperation. One job. Sunday paper in a town of 100K, a bio/eco-region of half a mil… One job I am uniquely qualified and would do out of desperation – a computer job. I’ll bet they get a thousand apps.
Good grief, Ten Bears, why aren’t you out on the beach with Susie? No way you are actually LOOKING for a job, is there?