Unemployment extension standoff...let them squirm....I am a Senator and I am employed!

Arthur Delaney
HuffingtonPost 7/7/10

Why won't Congress reauthorize unemployment benefits for people who've been out of work for longer than six months?

For the past several weeks, Republicans in the Senate, with an assist from Nebraska Democrat Ben Nelson, filibustered bills to reauthorize the benefits due to concerns about adding the cost of the aid to the deficit. Beneath the deficit concerns, however, there's something else: the suspicion that the long-term unemployed are a bunch of lazy drug addicts.

I know a thing or two about budgets as

I was governor of NE from 1991-1999 and

a Senator since 2001. Yes, I know the public

pays my salary, but if a bill does not benefit

my state more than others, I will simply not

vote for it...get over it and too bad and

quit your whining

It's not an opinion openly shared by most members of Congress, but a handful of senators and representatives from both parties have said this year that they suspect extended unemployment benefits actually discourage people from looking for work.

It started in March with Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), who said unemployment insurance "doesn't create new jobs. In fact, if anything, continuing to pay people unemployment compensation is a disincentive for them to seek new work."

Collecting unemployment is a disincentive to

seek new work however collecting a paycheck

from U.S. taxpayers since 1987 is a

great gig and I feel incentivized.

In May, Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) said extended benefits undermine the economic recovery because they "basically keep an economy that encourages people to, rather than go out and look for work, to stay on unemployment." And Rep. Jason Altmire (D-Pa.), after pushing party leaders to trim a domestic aid bill, said that in light of four months of job growth, "At some point you have to take a step back and look at the relative value of unemployment benefits versus people looking for jobs."

At some point, you do have to step back and

look at relative value. Let's talk relative value;

I owned millions in Bank of America stock during

TARP and fine blue collar workers of

America made sure my check cleared the bank

since 1981.

Altmire said business owners in his district (he declined to say which ones) complained of hiring trouble because potential workers would rather stay on the dole. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said the same thing when she neatly juxtaposed suspicion of the unemployed and deficit worries in a June comment off the Senate floor. Deficit hawks want the extended benefits, which until 36 days ago gave the unemployed an unprecedented 99 weeks of checks in some states, to be "paid for" instead of passed as emergency spending and adding the cost to the deficit.

See America, I am successful, you paid

my salary while I was Mayor of San Francisco

for 10 years and a Senator since 1992.

Feinstein said that while extended benefits during times of recession have never been paid for, "unemployment insurance has never carried the heavy weight that it does right now, the cost that it does right now, so people are concerned. And there isn't a lot of documentation on this. Last night for the first time I had somebody from a company tell me they've offered jobs to individuals and they said well, I want to not come back to work until my unemployment insurance runs out. So we need to start looking at these things. And we need to start paying for it."

(Feinstein's office later clarified that the senator "believes that unemployed Americans want jobs, not unemployment checks." Feinstein voted in favor of every attempt to reauthorize the benefits over the past month.)

At a June hearing on long-term unemployment, Rep. John Linder (R-Ga.) also trotted out the hard-luck business owner. "Even when businesses are willing to hire, nearly two years of unemployment benefits are too much of an allure for some," said Linder, citing an anecdotal Detroit News story about landscapers having trouble hiring unemployed folks who would rather stay on the dole. "The evidence is mounting that so-called stimulus policies rammed through Congress are doing more harm than good."

I have been gainfully employed courtesy of a

taxpayer salary since 2003...well,

actually 1993 when you include the fine

taxpayers of the Great State of Georgia.

To some on Capitol Hill, the jobless aren't just lazy -- they're on drugs, too. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) proposed drug testing the unemployed: "A lot of people are saying, 'Hey, it's about time. Why do we keep giving money to people who are going to go use it on drugs instead of their families?'"

I have been drug free (with the exception of my

pharmaceutical industry contributors) and

collecting a taxpayer salary since 1977.

It's all perfectly offensive to the unemployed. To be eligible for benefits, a person is required to have been laid off for economic reasons -- in other words, through no fault of his or her own. The benefits typically total 74 percent of the official poverty threshold for a family of four. There are five jobseekers for every job available, and a full third of the nearly 15 million unemployed don't receive benefits in the first place. Link to complete article

Orrin Hatch: Drug Test the Unemployed (Ryan Grim of Huffington Post)

Ryan Grim of Huffington Post:

Utah voters have reacted enthusiastically to Sen. Orrin Hatch's legislation to drug test the unemployed and those receiving other forms of government cash assistance, the Utah Republican told the Huffington Post after introducing his measure last week.

"A lot of people are saying, 'Hey, it's about time. Why do we keep giving money to people who are going to go use it on drugs instead of their families?'" Hatch said.

The goal, he said, is to get users into treatment.

"Now, it doesn't do away with food stamps. And it does get the help for them that they really need. And if they get the help, then they're right back on to the cash," he said.

He said he has gotten little feedback from his colleagues, however. Sens. Bob Bennett (R-Utah), Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and Scott Brown (R-Mass.) all told HuffPost they don't have an opinion yet on Hatch's measure and will have to study the language.

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), meanwhile, has an opinion. "I think it's a punitive attitude. Who's going to pay for the test? What's the point of the test? You know, why do you want to drug test people who have lost their job?" she wondered.

Hatch said the test would be paid for with money saved by not paying benefits. "Any monies left over would go to help the states with the drug testing and so forth, and if there's any surplus it goes to pay off the deficit," he said.

Hatch, asked if he thought his legislation should apply to members of Congress, wasn't sure at first. "Well, if they're getting cash assistance. No member of Congress that I know of gets welfare," said Hatch, though that depends on one's definition of welfare. Hatch, however, said he has no objection to adding members of Congress to the program. "I don't see why members of Congress should be exempt from anything, to be honest with you. We ought to have to live with the laws everybody else has to live with," he said.
Link to Orrin Hatch article

Grandpa: the world is truly coming to an end!!!! Orrin Hatch assumed office in 1977...your visa on this planet has expired Mr. Hatch!!!