Lengthy to-do list awaits lame duck session

[GG]

WASHINGTON – Now that the elections are over, a lame-duck Congress comes back to work this month to deal with a pile of unfinished business: whether to extend Bush-era tax cuts due to expire, give seniors a $250 Social Security special payment and repeal the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy against gays serving openly.

It's an open question how much they'll get done.

The current Congress returns Nov. 15 for a post-election session dominated by tax and spending issues. Rarely has such a big pile of work faced lawmakers when the party in power has suffered so much at the ballot box.

Lame duck sessions tend to be notoriously unproductive, especially when there's a turnover in the majority party. The party losing power is in a sour mood and just wants to go home; the party entering power usually prefers to wait until reinforcements arrive in January and wants most business put off so they can put their own stamp on it.

Read more:  http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101103/ap_on_bi_ge/us_congress_lame_duck

Round 1 is about to begin.

[heironymouspasparagus]

We are in the best of all possible scenarios - one party with the Presidency and the other with House.  Senate is a spoiler for either or both sides.  I submit it will be more difficult for either side to do much to hurt us.  We should be safer now for a while.

Jobs??  Yeah, right, like any of those are coming back anytime soon.  We probably should have kept a few from China while we had the chance.