WSWS: Jobless benefits cut off for a million US workers

[tonysam]

Good piece here.

The Democratic leadership calculated that by allowing Bunning to block the extension they would be able to put the Republican minority in a bad light. Reid, Durbin and Vice President Joseph Biden issued hypocritical statements denouncing Bunning, but there was no move to invoke cloture.

Instead, the Democrats said they would bring the bill up again next week. Responding to the political embarrassment, Republican Whip Jon Kyl said Sunday that while he supported Bunning in principle, the Republicans would vote to approve a 30-day extension for the unemployment program while further negotiations were conducted on a bipartisan bill to extend the program for an entire year.

The expiration of the unemployment extension will have an enormous impact on working people, particularly in the states hardest hit by the collapse of manufacturing employment. Michigan, for instance, has 300,000 workers receiving extended benefits under the federal program that has been at least temporarily shut down.

An estimated 400,000 workers will lose their unemployment benefits during the first two weeks of March if the extension is not quickly approved. If congressional inaction continues, that number will grow exponentially to nearly three million workers by May, according to the Department of Labor

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More political gamesmanship while people go without.

[TwilightGardener]

1. One Senator can keep the bill from the floor, if I have the rules right.

They can't get it considered or voted on until Bunning removes the hold on it. Not sure why the socialists are blaming Dems.

[tonysam]

2. Because, according to them, Harry Reid

could do something about it but didn't want to.