KIRO-TV: "Good news/bad news: Washington unemployment down, but benefits ending for those who still need them"

Kevin McCarty, KIRO 7 Eyewitness News:

It’s supposed to be good news – the unemployment rate in our state is falling – but for some long-term jobless residents in Washington, it means they’re about to lose their unemployment benefits.

Some could lose their unemployment checks within about two weeks, and for some, it’s their only source of income. It’s frightening news for people trying to get back into a tough job market.

“Now, you put out a resume and just – no one is calling you,” Dawn Duran said. MORE...

The Rude Pundit: "Don't worry. The tax cut extension will pass."

The Rude Pundit:

The unemployment benefits extension will pass, as it should. We will put off any hard decisions on our future again for two years. And then, don't worry, we'll put them off again. Because that's who we are. That's our learned behavior. We are Americans and we've forgotten how to sacrifice anything because no one for a generation has asked us to. We're like Nicholas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas: we've decided to drink ourselves to death while being cared for by whores. MORE...

Keith's Rant on "The Deal" (video)

MSNBC-Countdown, video (11:51).

"Loss of jobless benefits could be serious blow to U.S. economy"

Don Lee (LA Times):

Many Republicans and a small number of Democrats say they're not against continuing benefits for the unemployed, but they want the government's spending to be reduced by the same amount.

That throws jobless benefits into a bitterly partisan fight over preserving the Bush-era tax cuts and how to deal with the overall budget deficit, making it more likely than ever that the emergency federal benefits for the unemployed will be cut off permanently.

If that happens — and some leaders still hope to include a compromise on jobless benefits in a larger deal over tax cuts — it would come well before such benefits were curtailed after past periods of high unemployment.

It was 28 months after the deep recession in the early 1980s that emergency benefits ended, and unemployment then was 7.2%. It is now only 17 months since the official end of the last recession, and the jobless rate is at 9.6%. MORE...

Jim McDermott on The ED Show: "The Republicans don't care about the unemployed" (video)

MSNBC-ED Show, video (08:16).

"Unemployment Extension: Senate Democrats Introduce Yearlong Reauthorization Of Extended Jobless Aid"

Arthur Delaney (HuffPo):

Without a reauthorization, the Labor Department estimates that 2 million Americans will lose their benefits over the course of December, with 800,000 facing a cutoff this week alone.

Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said Sunday that Democrats may try to use unemployment benefits as part of a bargain reauthorizing soon-to-expire tax cuts for the rich.

The progressive Economic Policy Institute estimates that reauthorizing the benefits through 2011 would cost $65 billion. That's about 1.7 percent of the White House's projected 2011 budget. MORE...

GRITtv: Katrina vanden Heuvel: "Choosing Sides in Fight" (with video)

GRITtv, with video (13:49):

"Average people must look at the screens and see the disconnect—it's not left vs. right, it's top-down. It's establishment vs. people." So says Katrina vanden Heuvel of the average TV news show. She joins us, of course, here on GRITtv for our weekly partnership with The Nation magazine to bring you a different kind of political TV show. Katrina and Laura discuss the impending end of unemployment benefits for millions of Americans out of work, the members of Congress who will continue the fight for the people, real progressive taxation, and what Obama can do with his executive power to get around a gridlocked Congress.

"Sam Stein Talks About Failed Extension Of Unemployment Benefits" (video)

Huff Post with video (08:11):

HuffPost's Sam Stein appeared on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" Friday to talk about Congress's recent failure to pass an extension of unemployment benefits.

"They did it in a way where they needed a two-thirds majority and there's gonna be quibbling over that, but you're right, the optics are terrible," Stein said. "We're talking about 12.5 billion dollars to help two million unemployed people, and in three weeks we're going to, most likely, be passing the extension of the Bush tax cuts which will cost much more than that." MORE...

Jim McDermott on The ED Show on today's Unemployment Insurance Vote (video)

MSNBC-ED Show, video (12:02).

Howie P.S.: Jim McDermott visits with ED and talks about the vote to block jobless benefits today in the House. But first, ED goes on a rant.

"Unemployment Extension Defeated In House"

Arthur Delaney (HuffPo):

The House of Representatives on Thursday voted down a measure that would have reauthorized extended unemployment insurance for another three months, leaving no clear path forward to prevent the benefits from lapsing on schedule on Nov. 30.

Without a reauthorization, the Labor Department estimates that two million long-term unemployed will prematurely stop receiving benefits before the end of the year.

"I think it's a sad moment," said Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) after the vote. "It appalls me that the Republicans keep pitching and pitching and pitching the tax cuts for the rich and won't join in a bill to help people keep their homes and not have to live in their cars."

The bill was brought to the floor under a "suspension of the rules," meaning it required approval from two-thirds of the House. It failed 258 to 154. MORE...

Howie P.S.: According to Ed Schultz, the 99ers were not addressed in this legislation. Schultz says Jim McDermott will be on The ED Show tonight on MSNBC to discuss this.

Jim McDermott: Unemployment Standoff 'A Class Warfare Issue'

Arthur Dekaney (HuffPo)

It's a class warfare issue," said McDermott in an interview with HuffPost after the House vote. McDermott, chairman of the Ways and Means Income Security and Family Support Subcommittee, lamented the fact that congressional deficit hawks squawked little during two wars and when Congress authorized a $700 billion bailout of the financial industry.

"Wall Street is saying to them, 'These deficits, they're making problems, we need to get this deficit down,'" McDermott said. "So the very people who took the money and were stabilized because we created deficits are now turning around and biting the hand that feeds them, that is, the taxpayers. It's unconscionable." MORE...

"Senate GOP again kills jobless aid extension"

"Senate GOP again kills jobless aid extension" (AP):

For the third time in three weeks, Republicans in the Senate on Wednesday successfully filibustered a bill to continue providing unemployment checks to millions of people.

But since Republicans Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine voted with Democrats to advance the $33 billion measure, its passage seems assured next month once a replacement is named for Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd, who died on Monday. Democrats would then have a filibuster-proof majority for the bill. MORE...

Howie P.S.: Ben Nelson was the sole Democrat who joined with the Republican senators.

Sherrod Brown: "No recess until jobless benefits pass"

Joan McCarter (Daily Kos):

The good Senator named Brown is doing his damnedest to get jobless benefits passed.

The House and Senate should stay in session until they can pass an extension of unemployment insurance, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) said Wednesday.

Brown urged leaders to keep Congress in session and eat into the holiday weekend and next week's recess, if necessary, to pass a long-delayed extension of benefits and tax cuts that's stalled in the Senate.

"For too many weeks, Republicans have blocked legislation that would extend tax cuts for small businesses, close tax loopholes that encourage corporations to ship jobs overseas, and extend unemployment insurance," Brown said in a statement. "Congress should not adjourn for the July 4 holiday weekend without passing an extension of unemployment insurance."

This is the message Harry Reid needs to hear: keep them in. Bring out the cots. Only let them out to attend Sen. Byrd's funeral, and then bring them back. One thing we know, breaking out the cots tends to break loose Republican votes. Take their vacation away until they help the 1.2 million Americans who have prematurely lost their unemployment insurance.