Ol' Deficit Hawk George Does It Again

Today, January 28, 2010, the United States Senate took up the amendment to impose pay- as-you-go requirements on the United States Congress. This requirement, known as PAYGO, was credited by President Obama with helping achieve balanced budgets in Wednesday's State of the Union speech.

It works like this: If you are a Representative or a Senator and you want to propose a new Federal program, you have to come up the way to pay for the program. If you want to propose tax cuts, then you have to come up with spending cuts to balance out the tax cuts. Sounds simple, right? I mean if you were a deficit hawk, which is how George Voinovich describes himself, then you should love this idea.

Except, of course, George, along with the other 39 Republicans voted "Nay." Now why would they do that? Well, here's the situation they are in: They want to propose more and more tax cuts for the wealthy and for corporations, but they don't want to cut Federal programs to pay for the tax-cuts. Instead they want to keep running up the Federal deficit.

So once again, we see, just like we saw in 2001 and in 2003 with Bush's reckless tax cuts for the rich, which Ol' Deficit Hawk supported, that George Voinovich's claims to want a balanced budget are just so much Deficit Hawk bird poo.

Senate Votes for Cloture on Bill to Cut Off Funding for Iraq War

In what was seen as a surprise move, the Republicans in the United States Senate agreed to allow a vote on a bill to cut funding for the Iraq War and to redeploy troops out of Iraq within 120 days. Consequently the motion to invoke cloture passed by a vote of 70 to 24 with 6 Senators not voting.

Both Ohio Senators voted to invoke cloture, which may be the first time that Brown and Voinovich have voted the same way on a bill related to Iraq. Interestingly 21 of the 24 votes against invoking cloture on debating the bill came from Democrats. Democrats voting against cloture included both Democratic Senators from Delaware, and newly elected Democratic Senators Casey, Webb, Tester, and McCaskill.

The Republicans voted to allow the debate to go forward and to advance the bill to a vote because they think that the so-called "success" of the surge will help them move public opinion. Of course, a lot of that depends on how the Democrats frame the debate.

We hope that Democrats point out that Republicans are willing to spend billions of dollars on Iraqis, but not on Americans. Billions of dollars to rebuild Baghdad, but not New Orleans. Framing the debate that way makes the choices that Republicans are making very clear.

We would also like to see Democrats earmark the money saved by cutting funding for the war and deploying troops out of Iraq for helping ordinary Americans caught up in the foreclosure crisis or into developing alternative energy. Of course, it is all hypothetical anyway since Bush has already vowed to veto any bill cuts off funding and redeploy troops out of Iraq. Still, the debate could be interesting.

Hypocrisy, Thy Name is Voinovich!

Okay, much to no one's suprise, the other United States Senator from Ohio, George "I Help Enable Bush" Voinovich did not sign the letter condemning Rush Limbaugh for his "phony soldiers" remark. This, of course, after he voted to condemn Move-On for its ad about General Petraeus.

Now, we know it is not out of some concern for the First Amendment since he voted to condemn the Move-On ad. We also know it is not out of some concern that the United States Senate shouldn't spend its time on trying to regulate the speech of Americans, again since he voted for the resolution blasting Move-On for its ad. No, we are left with the explanation that once again George Voinovich would rather pander to the right-wing of his party than take a principled stand.

Here are two examples of a principled stand on this issue. One would have been to vote "Nay" on the Move-On resolution on the grounds that the United States Senate has no right trying to stifle the free-speech of Americans, no matter how obnoxious the subject of the speech. The second example would be to vote for the Move-On resolution and then sign the Reid letter on the grounds that neither Move-On or Rush Limbaugh should be criticizing soldiers serving in Iraq, no matter what their rank.

Voinovich didn't do the principled thing, rather, as always, he did the expedient thing by marching in lock-step with his party. That's our Georgie, always ready to break with the Republican right-wing, but never quite having the courage.

Voinovich Backs Bush, Screws Troops Again

Senator Jim Webb, (D-VA), sponsored legislation to require that troops spend as much time at home as they spend in Iraq. The bill came up for a vote today. Webb needed 60 votes to cut off debate on this bill. He got 56. Among the 43 voting against his legislation was, you guessed it, Ohio's own George Voinovich. Despite the fact that last week he indicated he might vote for the Webb legislation, in the final analysis he couldn't just bring himself to do something that Bubble-Boy didn't want him to do. Good to know where Voinovich stands when it comes to really supporting the troops.