Kit Bond

The St. Louis Beacon has a story today reprinting excerpts from a Kit Bond press release accusing Democrats of finding "a loophole to our constitution" in their consideration of using "deem and pass" procedures to advance health care reform legislation.

The U.S. Senate passed a $17.6 billion jobs bill today by a 68-29 vote, sending it to the White House for the President's signature. "The bill includes a payroll tax break for small businesses and highway funding designed to spur job growth," according to Politico.

A proposal to freeze earmark spending for fiscal years 2010 and 2011 was defeated in the Senate yesterday by a 68-29 vote. Sen. Kit Bond voted to kill the proposal, Sen. Claire McCaskill supported the moratorium.

Twenty-four Republicans voted for the measure, sponsored by Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), and 15 GOP senators voted against it.  Just four Democrats, including McCaskill, voted with DeMint for temporary ban.

A bipartisan supermajority ended a GOP filibuster of legislation to extend unemployment benefits through the end the year today.  However, Kit Bond voted against the cloture motion to end debate on the bill. The Associated Press summarizes the proposal:

Legislation to give additional months of unemployment benefits to people who have been out of a job for more than half a year has won key GOP support that means it will soon pass the Senate.

The sweeping bill also would prevent doctors from absorbing a crippling cut in Medicare payments and extends health insurance subsidies for the unemployed through December.

ThinkProgress has a great video today of Sen. Kit Bond and other Republicans Senators rallying their colleagues to pass legislation with simple majorities in recent years. The filibuster "is the product of a rule of the Senate passed many years after the ratification of the Constitution. This rule does not derive from the authority of the Constitution," Bond says in the video. Watch:

When Roy Blunt first announced that he did not support the jobs bill that passed the Senate with a large bipartisan majority (70-28), he initially said that the package was not large enough and should have included more spending (and more debt).  As reported by The Beacon's Jo Mannies on February 23:

Blunt said today that he would have held out for the larger bill, which he said included more tax incentives for business.

But now, Blunt says the bill costs too much.  As quoted in the Star on March 5:

"Washington Democrats threw more of Americans’ hard-earned money at the problem, passing a $15 billion so-called jobs bill that's just more of the same."

The jobs bill passed with 70 votes in the Senate, including Kit Bond's. Bond said the legislation "will help restore funding to Missouri and states across the nation that would have lost critical transportation projects and thousands of jobs." 

CNSNews.com:

Retiring Sen. Christopher “Kit” Bond (R-Mo.) said that Bunning was right to object to the fact that the Senate never got the opportunity to debate how the benefits would be funded, something Bond said should have happened. Bunning’s objections forced a floor vote on whether the bill should be paid for, a measure Bond supported.

Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) is filibustering legislation with an extension for unemployment benefits to help more than 1.2 million out-of-work Americans. Struggling families obviously count on these benefits to put food on the table, pay bills and keep a roof over their heads.In fact, the White House says 8,700 Missourians will not receive unemployment checks if the Senate fails to deal with Bunning's obstructionism.

In addition, two thousand federal highway workers were furloughed this morning because of Bunning's petty maneuvers. And today, his filibuster triggered a 21 percent fee reduction to doctors seeing Medicare patients starting today.

The Plum Line has put together a helpful analysis detailing which GOP Senators currently in office have voted for measures passed via reconciliation over the last 20 years. According to their research, Sen. Kit Bond has been voting to pass legislation via reconciliation at least 11 times since 1989.

Kit Bond says the jobs bill "will help restore funding to Missouri and states across the nation that would have lost critical transportation projects and thousands of jobs." 

UPDATE: Roy Blunt says he will vote against the jobs bill.

In a series of tweets this morning (here, here and here), Ed Martin is criticizing GOP Senators Kit Bond, Scott Brown, Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins and George Voinovich for their support of a new bipartisan job creation package. 

The bill, which passed a procedural vote the Senate yesterday 62-30 , includes a number of job creation measures that earned it bipartisan support.

Saturday:

Republicans — including Missouri’s Sen. Christopher “Kit” Bond and Reps. Roy Blunt of Springfield and Blaine Luetkemeyer of St. Elizabeth — are trying to have it both ways. They voted against the stimulus bill and continue to denounce it as they try to take credit for projects that it funded.

John Ashcroft thinks civilian courts have "use and utility" for trying terrorists, depending on circumstances. I'm not a member of the John Ashcroft fan club, but the Bush Department of Justice did brag about their criminal convictions of terrorists.

Ashcroft also flatly stated today that "when you have a person in the criminal justice system, you Mirandize them."  Such information has eluded the Ranking Member of the the Senate Intelligence Committee, Kit Bond. 

Standing by for Bond's hyperbolic response asking Ashcroft why he doesn't care about protecting Americans in 3...2...1...