The Senate voted 68-29 to end the debate on the craptastic $1 trillion infrastructure bill. It is now on the path to passing this week:
In a 68-29 vote, the Senate closed down debate on a bill that spends $550 billion in new money on the nation’s physical infrastructure. Sunday’s vote came after senators spent the weekend haggling over amendments and time agreements to consider them.Final passage of the legislation is expected late Monday night, or the wee hours of Tuesday at the latest, unless a deal is reached among all 100 senators to speed it up. A 50-hour budget debate and an unlimited “vote-a-rama” on nonbinding but politically symbolic topics will follow immediately after.
Sen. Bill Haggerty (R-TN) tried to slow down the debate:
Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.) said over the weekend that he would not allow the infrastructure bill to pass more quickly, dampening the Democratic majority’s enthusiasm for allowing the GOP to have more amendment votes. The Senate has considered more than 20 amendments to the bill thus far, but attempts to vote on two dozen more fell apart on Thursday night after Hagerty refused to expedite the bill as a condition of the deal.Hagerty on Sunday afternoon attempted to bring up 17 amendments by unanimous consent, but Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) objected, citing his refusal to come to a time agreement and potential objections from other senators.Other GOP senators also tried unsuccessfully on Sunday to bring up their own amendments.
Tucker Carlson named the 17 Republican senators who supported the stupid bill. The list contains the usual suspects, but also included Chuck Grassley (Iowa), James Risch (Idaho), Bill Cassidy (Louisiana), and Todd Young (Indiana).
These Republicans can never call themselves a fiscal conservative or want a small government.
I am a libertarian because I know neither party wants to stop spending or reducing the size of government. But at least the Democrats are honest about it. The Republicans complain about the debt and overreaching Democrats. They need to look in the mirror.
Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) tried to defend his support on Sunday Morning Futures:
The North Dakota Republican argued that the bill contains valuable spending for basic infrastructure including roads, bridges and airports, which are essential for the movement of goods throughout the nation.”Of the $1.2 trillion, $450 billion – that’s over a third of it – is not just infrastructure, it’s roads and bridges specifically,” Cramer told host Maria Bartiromo. “In addition to that, there’s ports, waterways, railroads, airports broadband, all of which are critical to the movement of goods and services around this country and around the world.”
Muh rooooooooadz!!! (That is the biggest trigger to a libertarian because so many people counter any argument with, “But the roads!”)
Gag me, Cramer:
The plan allocates billions to sectors such as resilience and water storage, power infrastructure and electric vehicles – all of which are arguably a precursor to green living.”Cybersecurity and resiliency of the grid is [sic] not exclusive to the Green New Deal,” the Senator said. “I think we’ve all experienced the problems with a lack of resiliency to our energy infrastructure. The colonial pipeline cyber-attack was a pretty good example of that.””Are there some things missing that we [Republicans] would love? Of course, there are,” he went on. “But this is a 50-50 senate. Democrats have a majority in the House and the White House so you’re going to have to take some of those things to get all the other really good things.”
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