Early Sunday morning, the House of Representative sent the Senate a counter offer of the spending bill it received following Senator Ted Cruz’s (R-TX) historic 21+ hour talk on Tuesday and Wednesday. In a vote of 231-192, the House sent legislation to the Senate that would continue funding the government, but delay Obamacare for one year and repeal the medical device tax. That vote included two Democrat votes in favor and Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) didn’t even vote!
House GOP Leaders announce plan to fund govt, avert shutdown tied to one year delay in ObamaCare & repeal medical device tax.
— Mark Knoller (@markknoller) September 28, 2013
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) says that the bill is dead on arrival and would not see Barack Obama’s desk due to the delay of Obamacare.
“We’ve made it very clear that the only way to solve this problem is just accept what we’ve done, just accept it,” he said.
Remember, this is the same Harry Reid that tweeted this just days before:
Governing must be a cooperative effort that sets aside the ideological or parochial concerns in favor of what is best for the nation.
— Senator Harry Reid (@SenatorReid) September 26, 2013
That doesn’t matter much, since Obama has stated that he would veto such a measure.
The government’s current spending authority is set to expire at midnight on Monday.
The House GOP leadership issued the following statement on Saturday:
The American people don’t want a government shut down and they don’t want ObamaCare. That’s why later today, the House will vote on two amendments to the Senate-passed continuing resolution that will keep the government open and stop as much of the president’s health care law as possible.
The first amendment delays the president’s health care law by one year. And the second permanently repeals ObamaCare’s medical device tax that is sending jobs overseas.
Both of these amendments will change the date of the Senate CR to December 15th. We will also vote on a measure that ensures our troops get paid, no matter what.
We will do our job and send this bill over, and then it’s up to the Senate to pass it and stop a government shutdown.
I don’t see a problem with the delay. After all, we’ve already seen this administration delay the employer mandate for a year and we’ve seen Congress and their staff get preferential treatment when it comes to Obamacare. I also don’t see a problem in holding your ground in saying that Obamacare won’t receive any funding and continuing to push for full repeal. After all, The GOP said the American people don’t want it, not that they want it delayed.
I think we all know why Obama and Reid aren’t budging. It’s because they have an agenda.
Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) wants to hold everyone to the law of Obamacare, including Barack Obama, the Supreme Court and all federal employees and is set to introduce an amendment to do just that.
Here’s the thing though, Obama will say one thing and do something completely different. For instance, in his weekly address, Obama said:
Despite Republican attempts to defund his signature healthcare reform law, the president promised that the next phase of the law will kick in on October 1 “no matter what.”
“I will work with anyone who wants to have a serious conversation about our economic future,” Obama said. “But I will not negotiate over Congress’ responsibility to pay the bills it has already racked up. I don’t know how to be more clear about this: no one gets to threaten the full faith and credit of the United States of America just to extract ideological concessions.
No one but you, isn’t that right Mr. Obama? He is threatening it by not negotiating. He threatened the full faith and credit of the US when he pushed the monster known as Obamacare. He threatened it when he and his party did not produce a budget for 5 years! He threatened it with his lack of leadership in having the Federal Reserve continue to print and spend more money, devaluing the dollar.
Granted, Congress went right along with it. They approved the fiscal cliff deal. They approved the raising of the debt ceiling. They most certainly bear some responsibility, but for Obama and Reid to conduct themselves in this manner is no surprise.
The Senate does not return to Washington until 2pm on Monday. That will give them just 10 hours to consider and pass the House bill. It’s doubtful they will do so.
Frankly, I don’t see an issue with shutting the government down until we get our house in order. It seems though that Barack Obama is more interested in speaking with the new Iranian leader, President Hassan Rouhani, than with members of Congress:
[youtube]http://youtu.be/g_dwIKpXvaU[/youtube]
In the past #Obama has called the House GOP 'hostage takers.' Today he spoke on the phone with the leader of Iran–which held US hostages
— John Ruberry (@Marathonpundit) September 27, 2013
Tim Brown is the Editor of Freedom Outpost.
