The Funny Farm
Where life is beautiful all the time and I'll be happy to see those nice young men in their clean white coats...
Adventures of a Basic Force For Good in Our TimeTM
Thursday, 29 Infusion 2006
Senate votes down minimum wage increase
[emphasis of any kind courtesy of the Funny Farm Editorial Staff]
Majority back Kennedy proposal to lift hourly wage to $7.25 by 2009, but votes fall short of 60 needed. WASHINGTON, (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate on Wednesday defeated a proposal pushed by Democrats to raise the federal minimum wage in increments from $5.15 to $7.25 an hour by Jan. 1, 2009. Sen. Edward Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat, unsuccessfully tried to attach the proposal raising the wage for the first time since 1997 to a defense authorization bill that is expected to be passed by the Senate soon. While a majority of the Senate, 52 senators, backed the move to increase the minimum wage, the measure failed to win the 60 votes needed for passage under a procedural agreement worked out earlier. Operating under those same rules, the Senate was expected to also defeat a Republican-backed amendment that would raise the minimum wage in two steps to $6.25. But that measure also would change some work rules, drawing Democratic opposition. House Democrats, like their Senate counterparts, are pushing a $2.10-per-hour minimum wage increase. Last week, the House Appropriations Committee voted to include the wage hike in a fiscal 2007 labor and health spending bill. House Republican leaders, who oppose raising the minimum wage, have put that bill on a back burner because of the amendment. |
I would have snipped some stuff out of this, but since this news "story" has very little meat to it, I thought I'd show you the whole thing.
Do you find it interesting, as I do, that the Democratic proponent is named, but the Repugnican't one is not? Do you also notice that the vaunted Democratic disunity is nowhere to be found on this issue? Why, it's almost as though Democratic disunity is a Repugnican't takling point or something...
I also found this article on the internets when Googling for media reports on the refusal of congress to give anyone but themselves a raise this year:
Senate Kills Minimum Wage Hike CAPITOL HILL — Fact One: For the last nine years, the minimum wage has been set at $5.15 an hour. That's $206 a week or a little more than $10,000 a year for those who put in a 40-hour work week — mostly those in service-industry jobs. Fact Two: During those same nine years, members of Congress have seen their wages grow by $28,500. House and Senate members are now paid $162,000 annually for their public service jobs. Those distinctive facts apparently made little difference to the Senate on Monday, which beat down two measures to raise the minimum wage. Though the two sides of the political debate agreed to consider the measures, Senate rules left lawmakers with the clear understanding that neither measure would muster enough votes to pass. Sen. Ted Kennedy sponsored the first measure, one to raise the minimum for low-income workers incrementally to $7.25 an hour over the next 26 months. The phase-in would have occurred as three 70-cent raises. [snip] The second proposal, offered by Sen. Rick Santorum, would raise the minimum to $6.25 an hour over the next 18 months in two 55-cent increases. But Santorum's proposal also included modest tax breaks for small businesses and opportunities for workers to opt for more flexible schedules that opponents say allows employers to avoid overtime. [snip] Despite the debate, under unusual Senate rules, both sides of the aisle agreed that if neither measure received 60 votes — enough to overcome threatened filibusters — the amendments to the bankruptcy bill would be withdrawn. That is, in fact, what happened. Kennedy's amendment went down 46-49. Santorum's measure failed 61-38. Both sides of the aisle can now claim honestly to have voted for an increase in the minimum wage, even though they knew full well neither proposal had a real chance of passing. Democrats say they will try again, but House Republican leaders said even if a Senate measure passed, they would not consider any bill for a minimum wage increase this year. Most participants and observers say they see this as a dead issue for the foreseeable future. |
Other than the fact that the congresscritters now get $165,200 a year now, these two articles could have been talking about the same event. Isn't it funny how, now that Repugnican'ts have been in control of everything for over five years now, we still seem to be having the same debates every year? Almost as if these Repugnican't bastiches are deliberately wasting taxpayers' time and money on meaningless boll-yotz, and derailing anything that might actually be of use to the average american.
Just wondering: why isn't there some sort of automatic increase in the minimum wage every year to keep pace with inflation? You know, the way there's an automatic pay increase for overpaid congresscritters making over $165,000 a year every year to keep pace with inflation? It would kinda make more sense to have those who are impacted the most by cost of living increases get the most help in easing that impact. At least, here at the Funny Farm it seems that way...
* - "Yeah - they stink on ice!"**
** - yes, this is yet another set of lines of dialogue shamelessly ripped off creatively reused for the title of this blog post from History of the World part one.