Thursday, March 03, 2011

Schweikert votes to protect oil companies

Tuesday, the U.S. House of Representatives passed H.J. Res 44, a resolution continuing government operations for another two weeks, by a vote of 335 - 91.  As one can see from those totals, support for the measure was bipartisan, even if a lot of that support was of the "I'll hold my nose and vote for this anyway" variety.

Less bipartisan was the vote on a proposal by Rep. Bill Keating (D-MA) to add a clause to the measure "prohibiting the use of funds to be used for tax benefit or relief for any major integrated oil company."

What is possibly the single most profitable industry in the world is also one of the most highly subsidized.

Arizona's David Schweikert (R-CD5), a self-professed fiscal hawk, someone who never fails to grab an opportunity to rail about the federal deficit, had an opportunity to vote to cut the federal deficit by BILLIONS of dollars.

So what did he do?

Voted with every other Republican in the House of Representatives to continue the budget-busting (but oh-so-campaign-contribution-friendly) corporate subsidies.

The proposal to end oil company subsidies for as long as the federal government is operating under a continuing resolution (as opposed to an actual budget) went down 176 - 249.

Of course.

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