This stunning lame duck session

[impik]

Would never happen without the tax cuts compromise. That is a fact. This is life. You face the world as it is. Two years extension of tax cuts for 2% of the country, in exchange to:

* DADT
* START
* Food Safety
* Judges appointed
* 9/11 First Responders
* Unemployment extended
* Health Insurance companies have to justify more than 10% increase
* Nutrition bill
* Shark Protection
* Huge tax cuts package for the middle class




Brilliantly played, Mr. president. Brilliantly played.

[UndertheOcean]

1. Multiverse Chess player.

[NJGeek]

2. shark protection

is that for protecting me from sharks? hope so...

[karynnj]

5. Nope protecting sharks from people killing sharks just for their fins

[WCGreen]

6. But can they still kill them just for fun?

[karynnj]

9. I don't think so, but the greater threat is those who kill for the fins

[leveymg]

3. Gee, agreeing to a quarter trillion in upper class tax breaks bought us that much?

And, we get to dip into the Social Security Trust fund, to boot. Wow - genius, super-genius.

The shark protection is the cherry on the top.

[vaberella]

4. What are you talking about SS?! People are talking about funding to Israel getting cut. n/t

[avaistheone1]

7. Where have you been?

While Obama’s deal ostensibly provides for general revenue to be placed into the trust fund to make up the lost payroll tax revenue, there is little reason to believe that this funding would persist beyond the first year. Again, does anyone believe that President Obama will stand up for Social Security on this point?

In short, this deal is a very large first step toward cutting and/or privatizing Social Security. If the President wants to remove this risk he can simply arrange to have the exact same tax cut given to workers from general revenue. There is no legitimate reason for the Republicans to reject this change in structure, unless their intent is to destroy Social Security.
It’s really that simple. The structure of the deal would be changed unless the point is to undermine Social Security.

http://www.cepr.net/index.php/op-eds-&-columns/op-eds-&-columns/the-tax-deal-and-the-apocalypse

[leveymg]

10. . Self-delete.

Misunderstood who the comment above was directed at.

[Skink]

12. I think we should explore alternative funding for Social Security.

like a hefty capitol gains tax. With the precipitous decline in wages we need to do these things. I am against the payroll tax cut however, in fact I would pay more.

[bvar22]

19. Your response is only for those paying attention.

Get with the program or you're gonna miss the VICTORY Parade!!!!!!!!!

[leveymg]

8. I think the cuts to foreign aid are being talked about for nxt year.

Social Security is already in the chute.

[avaistheone1]

11. Not so brilliant at all.

Giving tax cuts to the wealthy is not hard work, and will only contribute to the debt and financial ills of this country.



The Food Safety Bill is a joke. This is a sad give away to the big corporations
S.510 is the Patriot Act of farming. And the reason it got so much support from the large corporations is because it will effectively destroy many small, local organic farms by suffocating them under a new regulatory burden -- even when they're not the problem to begin with! Food safety is only a problem because of the factory animal operations that comingle with large, corporate food operations, thereby contaminating fresh produce with animal-grown bacteria. E.coli, for example, cannot multiply in plants! It can only grow in the intestines of animals.
Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/030789_Food_Safety_small_farmers.html#ixzz18sS7UuSX



The Nutrition Bill although the program itself is a good idea - the way it is funded is not. The Nutrition Bill takes money from the hungry on the Food Stamp program for its funds. That's outrageous and it is really robbing Peter to pay Paul. The money should have come from another source...how about the Pentagon?


DADT, START = good.

[leveymg]

13. Most of the Pentagon brass wanted DADT and START, so it would have passed, anyway.

We shouldn't believe this is all just about the 8th and 9th levels of Obama's chess game.

[avaistheone1]

16. Good to know.

I hadn't followed both of those issues as carefully as I should have.

So in other words what the Pentagon wants, the Pentagon gets.

[leveymg]

18. Along with the banks, it's the only interest group in America that almost always gets

just about everything they want. Yes.

I know that Gates, along with Mullen and several of the other Joint Chiefs have been saying for years that DADT is an impediment to recruitment and retention, particularly officers, and actually degrades readiness.

The Marine Corps brass have been the most resistant to lifting the ban, but that was a minority view.

[Milo_Bloom]

14. A very bad deal.

[liberal N proud]

15. So many doubted The President

All the GOP had to do was sit on the clock and he knew it.

Now he has a very productive congress in the history books.

[C_U_L8R]

17. This duck has teeth

as the pukes have just learned.

What a nice holiday present.