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Republicans Let US Auto Fail
by Doctor Who Thu Dec 11, 2008
As I listen to C-Span it is obvious that the US Auto Bailout is dead! And let it be clear it is the Senate Republicans who killed it!
After a few speeches Harry Reid will hold a cloture vote on the Bill which Reid expects to fail. He is then going to close the doors and go home.
Why? All because the Republicans could not get their amendment to establish by a date certain, pay equity between non-union, foreign car workers and UAW workers building US cars.
The good the bad and the ugly of all this after the jump
The Good:
For once the Dems. played chicken and forced the Repugs to blink. They held fast against selling out the US UAW worker. Give credit to Chris Dodd and Deb Stabineau who clearly hung this around the Repubs neck where it belongs.
The Bad:
The Southern Repugs killed this Bill for the sole purpose of favoring foreign car in their home States over US car companies in the Northeast. The purpose of their little pay equity ploy had nothing to do with saving US auto companies and workers, and everything to do with preventing unions being formed among the foreign car workers in their States.
The Ugly:
As Sen. Dodd so eliquently put it, there is a good chance it will be an ugly day on Wall Street tomorrow and even uglier days ahead for thousands of US autoworkers and the communities in which they live.
1 Comment:
The final vote on cloture was 52-35, with 12 not voting. The Democrats could have gotten cloture if they had all pulled together.
Sen. Reid voted against cloture, but that was for procedural reason, so if seven more votes could be picked-up, Reid would have cast the deciding 60th vote.
Four Senate Democrats did not vote; Senators Biden, Kennedy, and Kerry were amongst them. If those three senior Democrats were to vote for cloture, it is quite possible that their clout could have swayed a vote for cloture from the fourth non-voting Democrat and the three Democrats who voted against cloture.
That, plus Sen. Reid, would have been enough, and all it would have taken was for Senate Democrats to pull together. Considering that this was a cloture vote, and that the three who voted against cloture could have just as easily voted for cloture and then against the actual bill, it would seem that this was more of a lack of cohesion amongst Democrats.
Keep in mind that 20% of Senate Republicans voted for cloture. There were enough Democrats to reach cloture, with the assistance of those Republicans, but Sen. Reid couldn't bring those in his party together in order to simply get this to an up-or-down vote.
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