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Macomb, IL – After holding jobless Americans hostage, Washington Republicans more interested in power than purpose last week achieved a win-win result over Obama and maybe the Democrats.
Republicans forced the President of the majority party to give in to demands to let the wealthiest Americans keep their temporary tax cuts for two more years, and when the treasury is hurt by the absence of the $700 billion estimated to be lost by the rich not sharing the costs of government, the GOP will criticize the White House for adding to the deficit.
Oh, yes, and despite Obama surrendering for the good of the country and the needy - jobless Americans whose unemployment benefits were exhausted - he did so without much of a fight, so he doesn't appear to be selfless, but scared of Republicans, weak and doubting his own base. So: win-win-win for the GOP.
Not so much for regular Americans, of course - especially people who've been jobless so long they've run out of their aid. Jobless benefits ran out for 800,000 Americans the week after Thanksgiving, and 2.2 million others faced losing theirs by the end of this month, and 7 million more in the next year.
Almost all of them, of course, are without work through no fault of their own, and they get by off weekly unemployment checks. Set at 36% of their average weekly wage, jobless benefits barely cover housing costs for most folks.
Food? Utility bills? Kids clothes? Christmas? "Who cares?" Capitol Hill Republicans seemed to say, maneuvering their minority power to insist that the people who've been hurt the least by the lousy economy will continue to benefit the most.
GOP leaders in Washington, where Congress wants to adjourn this week, admitted that their priorities are ensuring that Obama is not re-elected and that their wealthy pals get the tax cuts due to expire this month extended. Republicans crowed that nothing would get through them before the rich were helped.
President Bush promised that the 2001 tax cuts would help the economy, claiming that an enriched upper class would invest more and at least indirectly hire more Americans. But that didn't happen. Congresswoman Chellie Pingree (D- Maine) said tax cuts for the wealthy have done nothing to stimulate the economy.
She said, "It's time that we let those end."
Also, more than half of the Bush tax benefits went to the top 1% of earners anyway, according to Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson in their book Winner-Take-All Politics.
But that doesn't seem to matter to Republicans like Dave Camp, the Michigan Congressman and incoming chairman of the powerful Ways & Means Committee - where tax policies originate. Camp said he wants even more tax cuts, despite the deficit and debt.
Some House Democrats found some spine and passed a measure last week that would've extended the temporary tax cuts only to the working and middle classes, but Senate Republicans threatened to block even voting on it. Other Democrats have seemingly had it with one-way compromises and oppose the plan.
Financially helping people who don't need it, and threatening Americans who do, is outrageous. The GOP should be ashamed of itself. But it's not, despite contributing to an increasing polarization of the country - in economic as well as political terms.
Harvard economist Lawrence Katz described the dire situation to journalist Andy Kroll.
"Think of the American economy as a large apartment block," Katz said. "A century ago - even 30 years ago - it was the object of envy. But in the last generation its character has changed. The penthouses at the top keep getting larger and larger. The apartments in the middle are feeling more and more squeezed and the basement has flooded. To round it off, the elevator is no longer working. That broken elevator is what gets people down the most."
This week, it seems that the repair crew Americans overwhelmingly elected in 2008 are disappointing, too.
More and more, it seems like the GOP's win-win political strategy is creating a lose-lose consequence for the nation.
Bill Knight is a freelance writer who teaches at Western Illinois University