Category: Congress sucks

Last year, Congress voted to cut the cost of living allowance for disabled veterans, widows and military retirees. Yesterday they voted to restore those cuts. And since this shaping up to be a form of class warfare, they also voted to make up for that cut cut from Medicare in 2024. According to Stars & Stripes;

The fate of the repeal legislation is unclear at this point. House Republicans offset the impact on the deficit of restoring COLA by adding cuts to Medicare that would take effect in 2024. Democrats have come out against this aspect of the legislation.

“We are simply robbing one group of deserving people – Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security recipients – to pay for helping another group of deserving people, our military retirees. This is just a shell game, and it is irresponsible,” Rep. Adam Smith, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, said in a press release.

I’m pretty sure that the cut to Medicaid will never happen, since Congress has ten years to buy back the votes from Medicaid recipients, however, I don’t remember Adam Smith defending the cuts to veterans’ pensions last year. I don’t remember him saying that cuts to the pensions of the disabled and widows was irresponsible.

Since the only bill in regards to the cut to veterans’ COLA that Harry Reid will allow for a vote, the Bernie Sanders bill, the one that adds more spending to the budget instead of less, you can bet that it will never make it to the president’s desk.

Last year, the Republicans in Congress succumbed to that “bi-partisan” thing when they all signed on to the cut in cost of living allowances for retirees, disabled veterans and their survivors. So they took it in the shorts and now they’re scrambling to get their reputation for supporting the troops back. But, Harry Reid and Bernie Sanders has something for them, according to the Washington Post;

Lawmakers from both parties have proposed repealing the pension cut with various bills, some of which would replace the savings with reductions in other areas such as spending on Egypt and Pakistan or Saturday mail delivery from the U.S. Postal Service.

Sen. Bernard Sanders (I-Vt.) has introduced an omnibus Veterans Affairs bill that would eliminate the pension cut and expand certain veterans benefits, such as dental and medical care, education and caretaker stipends. The legislation would cost $30 billion over 10 years, according to the lawmaker.

Sanders said last month that he is open to paying for the measure with savings from winding down overseas contingency operations, formerly known as the global war on terror.

Along with restoring the cuts to COLA, Sanders has included more spending, so that restoring cuts would actually cost more than it would otherwise. No fiscally responsible member of the GOP would vote for that, so Republicans will be blamed once again for the cuts if Sander’s measure should fail. And that “savings” from ending the war on terror is a mythical beast which will never make an appearance, like that “peace dividend” we heard so much about in the 90s.

The group, Concerned Veterans of America agrees with me;

The Comprehensive Veterans Health and Benefits and Military Retirement Pay Restoration Act of 2014 (S.1950), a new omnibus bill introduced by Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont), would vastly and prematurely expand access to veterans benefits (regardless of disability status), driving up costs and creating further delays in a VA system that is already failing to meet veterans needs. S.1950 does replace the military retirement COLA cuts, a much needed fix; but it does so with $30 billion in additional spending, paid for by taking from war funds. As a result, CVA opposes the Sanders bill, and instead supports S.1977 — an updated version of Senator Kelly Ayotte’s Honor Our Promise Act. S.1977 also repeals the COLA cuts, but does not increase spending and does not divert much-needed war funding.

Unfortunately, Ayotte’s bill won’t get past Harry Reid.

Nancy Pelosi is trying to rewrite history, claiming that Republicans are big meanies because they won’t let Democrats have their way. She claims that Democrats really tried to work with President Bush, well, sort of. From the Washington Times;

Mrs. Pelosi argued that while Democrats opposed Mr. Bush on many issues, including the Iraq War and his efforts to privatize Social Security, they also worked together on many issues such as the Wall Street bailout and energy legislation.

“We did not treat President Bush this way,” she said. “We thought we had a responsibility to work with the president to get a job done for the American people and we did. This obstruction to President Obama is something quite stunning. It’s something quite different.”

Oh, really? Did any Republicans stand on the roof of Bashar Assad’s palace in Syria and declare that he was more credible than the president, because Democrat congressmen did that before the Iraq war. Speaking of Syria, I’m pretty sure that Nancy Pelosi went to Syria to sit down with Assad and play footsie with him despite Bush State Department objections. The Democrat controlled Congress didn’t pass a budget the last two years of the Bush Administration because they were spending all of their time trying to undermine the war in Iraq. How is that “working with the President”? Jim Webb, Democrat Senator from Virginia, snubbed President Bush in the White House. If a Republican did that today, we’d hear howling from the Democrats, the likes of which we’d never heard before.

Well, y’all know the stories, they are legion. But, my point is; get over it, Democrats. I’m particularly happy that Congress gets nothing done these days, especially when what they do get done screws American citizens to the wall.

Compare and contrast this with the previous blog post I wrote about Democrats worried about Obama’s proposal to cut the rate of growth of Social Security pensions. From the Washington Free Beacon;

Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) “filled the amendment tree” on Thursday, ending debate and blocking any Republican amendments to a bill to extend unemployment insurance (UI) benefits.

Among them was Ayotte’s measure, which would repeal cuts to military pensions by ending a loophole in the tax code that allows illegal immigrants to receive the Additional Child Tax Credit. Her attempt to get a vote failed 42-54, with only one Democrat, Sen. Joe Manchin (W.Va.), voting with Republicans.

“It’s a sad day when a common sense amendment to responsibly pay for legislation that helps struggling Americans, repeals unfair military retirement benefits and reduces the deficit can’t even get a vote in the Senate,” Ayotte said in a statement.

[…]

Ayotte offered her plan, the “Keeping Our Promise to Our Military Heroes Act’’ (S. 1869), as an amendment to the UI bill. The measure would require a Social Security number in order for an individual to receive the Additional Child Tax Credit. Ayotte’s office said the bill would save approximately $20 billion over 10 years.

So can we expect Dianne Feinstein to stick up for veterans in the Senate? This is me not holding my breath.

By the way, Harry Reid is a draft dodger using the Left’s own definition as applied to Dick Cheney, since Reid and Chaney both spent their draftable years going to college.

The Hill reports that Democrats are begging the President to abandon plans to cut COLA increases to Social Security benefits, because, you know the president is only in the business of cutting benefits that Americans have earned, rather than cut the benefits of the leeches who have added nothing to the greatness of the nation. But that’s not the problem that Congressional Democrats have with the cuts;

But Democratic lawmakers say Obama should shelve the idea now that they are facing a difficult midterm election where they need to turn out the liberal base to preserve their Senate majority.

“I’m not sure why we should be making concessions when the Republicans show absolutely no willingness to do the same,” said Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.).

Democrats acknowledge it may be awkward for Obama to rescind his proposal, but say it would unwise of him to repeat the offer in the budget that is due out next month.

“I think it’s difficult for the president to pull it back after he already floated it but I would love to see it shelved until Republicans show they’re actually going to do something on their side of the ledger,” Murphy said.

Now, wait a second, these are the same sorts of cuts that Congress made to COLA increases in the pensions of disabled and retired veterans, now that’s not enough for Democrats. “Their side of the ledger” is code, or dog whistle, or whatever you want to call it, for further cuts to defense spending. I’m pretty sure that “Republican cncessions” might include those cuts to veterans’ pension increases, but apparently it doesn’t count.

Liberal Democrats say cutting Social Security benefits, even what centrists view as moderate cuts, is broadly unpopular across age groups. They say there mere proposal of reductions would amount to a self-inflicted political wound that would come back to haunt their party in the midterm election.

“It’s a very controversial issue at a difficult time for the senior community,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who declined to express support or opposition to the proposal.

Yeah, it’s pretty unpopular in veteran communities, too, you ditz, but that didn’t stop anyone from going ahead with it anyway, and I don’t remember Feinstein trying to halt cuts on veterans’ pensions.

For the record, I oppose this cut to Social Security benefits, just like I do for veterans’ pensions, because as I said, many of the people who receive Social Security benefits actually paid money into the system and earned their pay outs. But, I’m pretty sure I won’t see USAToday or the Washington Post editorial boards telling us how cuts to COLA benefits for social security recipients is a wonderful idea and argue how “miniscule” the cuts will be.