Debt Limit Increase . . .again.

[Gaspar]

Strange stuff happening right now on the senate floor.
http://www.c-span.org/video/?317782-1/SenateSession5389

40 mins since a vote was called.  Everyone sitting around with a look of dismay. Vote clerk still won't call the names and votes.  It looks as if advance of the bill failed to pass the senate with 60 votes!!

EDIT: Quote just posted by Jamie Dupree reporting from the floor "The vote clerk still hasn't called the names and votes of the Senators; highly unusual"
"Several Democratic Senators looking glum, standing with arms folded on the Senate floor"

[Gaspar]

Just passed 67 to 31.  Three Republican senators pushed it past. Very strange.  The turned off the mic and didn't announce the votes.

[Gaspar]

Now they are actually voting on the extension and there is commotion again when they got to Senator Boxer.

Something odd is happening.   They broke the filibuster but I think they may be unsure of their ability to pass the extension.

[Gaspar]

It's going to pass, but Harry is losing his grasp.  This may be the last debt limit increase he can squeak by.  As midterms approach it will be even harder for him.

[Hoss]

It's going to pass, but Harry is losing his grasp.  This may be the last debt limit increase he can squeak by.  As midterms approach it will be even harder for him.

Cruz pushed for cloture.  He's gonna be popular in the GOP tonight.

[Gaspar]

Cruz pushed for cloture.  He's gonna be popular in the GOP tonight.

Cloture was passed, but the commotion was odd.  Harry only passed the measure by a handful of votes and from the looks of him and warren working the floor, they fought for those among their own.  That means that these vulnerable Dems are thinking about the election.

[Townsend]

Senate advances debt ceiling bill

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/02/senate-debt-ceiling-vote-103437.html

n a suspenseful vote, the Senate agreed to advance legislation that would lift the debt ceiling into 2015.

The procedural hurdle was full of drama as Republicans were reluctant to provide the five votes needed to move forward with the bill. Ultimately, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas) — both of whom are up for reelection this year and face primary challengers — voted to advance the debt hike measure.

In a suspenseful vote, the Senate agreed to advance legislation that would lift the debt ceiling into 2015.

The procedural hurdle was full of drama as Republicans were reluctant to provide the five votes needed to move forward with the bill. Ultimately, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas) — both of whom are up for reelection this year and face primary challengers — voted to advance the debt hike measure.

After the House passed the same bill largely on the backs of Democrats on Tuesday, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz (R) demanded the 60-vote threshold on the debt hike, which meant that five Republican senators needed to side with Democrats to push through the measure.

But that proved difficult on Wednesday as senators rushed to try and approve the bill before getting out of town before a snowstorm was expected to hit.
The debt ceiling is expected to expire on Feb. 27.

Cruz and outside conservative groups pushed Senate Republicans to band together and block the debt ceiling legislation. Heritage Action for America blasted out a "no" vote recommendation on Wednesday morning, calling the bill "extremely reckless," and the Club for Growth also opposed the bill.

Democrats were negotiating earlier Wednesday with Cruz (R-Tex.) to allow a quick vote.

"Sen. Cruz has some thoughts he has to share with us," Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin said. "And often times, it takes a little while to express them. ... He wants to speak."
But in the end, Cruz didn't come to the floor to express their opposition to a clean debt hike. Neither did anyone else — there was essentially no debate at all.
The chamber moved to pass the legislation with much less tumult than the House, which approved the bill on Tuesday.

After much intraparty squabbling, Speaker John Boehner (Ohio) decided to put a clean debt ceiling hike on the House floor, which passed 221-201, although only 28 Republicans supported it.
Boehner dropped various plans to attach policy language to the hike — including reversing cuts to pensions for military retirees — after he couldn't garner enough Republican support.
There was urgency to get this vote done, but it has less to do with a potential credit default and more to do with the weather. A powerful snowstorm is predicted to smack into Washington, D.C., on Wednesday evening, and the Senate is scheduled for a week-long recess next week.

Though the debt ceiling was technically breached last week, the Treasury Department has estimated that Congress has until the end of February or so to lift the country's borrowing authority.

[Gaspar]

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/13/us/politics/senate-debt-ceiling-increase.html?_r=0

WASHINGTON — Senate Republican leaders on Wednesday rescued a measure to raise the nation's borrowing limit, overcoming a threatened filibuster from members of their own party and averting a potential shock to the economy.

A vote to cut off debate on the debt ceiling measure passed 67 to 31, after a dramatic scene on the floor when Republicans managed to muster 12 votes in support, clearing the way for final approval.

Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, and Senator John Cornyn of Texas, the Republican whip, waited nearly a half-hour as their Republican colleagues refused to vote to end debate on the bill. When it was clear that the debt ceiling increase would fail, they stepped forward in tandem to deliver the deciding votes.

RELATED COVERAGE

News Analysis: An Act of Surrender May Strengthen Boehner's ControlFEB. 12, 2014
The House speaker, John A. Boehner of Ohio, at a House Republican conference at the Capitol last month. Mr. Boehner has been caught between divisions in his party over the debt ceiling.House Approves Higher Debt Limit Without ConditionFEB. 11, 2014
The Senate then quickly voted to raise the nation's borrowing limit, without any conditions, until March 2015, sending the legislation to President Obama to be signed. The passage ended the possibility of a calamitous debt default, as lawmakers scrambled to get out of town before a snowstorm rolled in.

The 55-to-43 vote, largely along party lines, ended three years of fiscal brinkmanship in which the threat of a default hung over acrimonious debt ceiling negotiations, and came a day after the Republican-controlled House passed the same legislation by relying almost entirely on Democratic votes.

The legislation required 60 votes to clear a procedural hurdle and break a threatened filibuster after Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, said he planned to object to any effort to raise the debt ceiling with a minimum of 51 votes. But he failed in his attempt to unite Senate Republicans to prevent the increase.

"In my view, every Republican should stand together against raising the debt ceiling without meaningful structural reform to rein in our out-of-control spending," Mr. Cruz said Wednesday. However, when asked if he thought a default on the nation's debt was an option, he said, "Of course not."

But Mr. Cruz's high-profile gambit created the drama of the day.

Senate Republicans — unwilling to default on the nation's debt but hoping to avoid voting for any debt ceiling increase — seethed at Mr. Cruz's move, which many said was purely political and which forced them to scramble to produce at least five votes to end debate and move on to a final vote.

Senator John Hoeven, Republican of North Dakota, simply smiled when asked if he was annoyed with Mr. Cruz's filibuster threat. "We're working to see what we can put together, but I don't know yet how it's going to go," he said.

The vote on Tuesday in the House, in which only 28 Republicans joined their Democratic colleagues to support the "clean" debt ceiling increase, was the first time since 2009 that an increase in the nation's borrowing limit was not attached to other legislation.

But Speaker John A. Boehner of Ohio was unable to rally his conference behind even a modest Republican policy proposal, and in violation of his own "Boehner Rule" — which calls for any increase in the debt ceiling to be offset by an equal spending cut or budgetary changes — the speaker ignored outside conservative groups and his party's far right, passing the bill with Democratic support.

[Hoss]

Cloture was passed, but the commotion was odd.  Harry only passed the measure by a handful of votes and from the looks of him and warren working the floor, they fought for those among their own.  That means that these vulnerable Dems are thinking about the election.

Sounds to me like it wasn't Harry that needed the votes.  McConnell and Cornyn did.  Sure, technically Reid needed it, but did the Republicans, once again, want to look like the party of no when Raphael shut the government down last time?

I don't think the Calgary Cowboy is going to be much more popular within the center of his party.  Not that he was real popular to start.

[Cats Cats Cats]

Cloture was passed, but the commotion was odd.  Harry only passed the measure by a handful of votes and from the looks of him and warren working the floor, they fought for those among their own.  That means that these vulnerable Dems are thinking about the election.

You should quit your job as full time Obama complainer and start doing Senate and House color commentator.

[Gaspar]

You should quit your job as full time Obama complainer and start doing Senate and House color commentator.

Pay sucks.

[cannon_fodder]

My receptionist is German and asked about the "debt ceiling." After I explained that Congress passes bills to spend money, then passes other laws giving various agencies money to spend non the laws they pass, then has to pass another law to borrow money to cover what they have already voted twice to spend money on.

She was confused why there would be agreement twice to spend the money and to give them the money to spend, but a fight to allow the government to actually get the money to give to the agency to spend.

At that point I was done.  She grasped it perfectly.

[Gaspar]

http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/budget/fy2015/assets/appendix.pdf

The president released his 2014 budget today.

$3.9 Trillion Dollars, and the strange part is that he did not include the typical Analytical or Historical tables that accompany a presidential budget.  Obviously he realizes that this is just a bunch of paper that congress could care less about. 

Probably shouldn't' even waste the CBO's time this year in an attempt to score it.