IS THIS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE - PORKIE PIG SEN Reid Pulls Controversial $1.2 Trillion Spending

DON'T HOLD YOUR BREATH YET... UNTIL THEY ALL GO HOME ON BREAK. I CAN'T TRUST THESE HONORABLE CONGRESSMAN AS LONG AS THEY SIT IN LEGISLATION, PLANNING  THEIR SELFISH DESIRES AND OUR ULTIMATE DEMISE.

Majority Leader Harry Reid, bowing to Republican opposition to a 1,924-page $1.2 trillion spending measure packed with earmarks, withdrew the bill and said he would work with Republican leaders on a smaller, short-term budget fix to avoid a looming government shutdown.

 

Republicans had strongly condemned the $1.27 trillion omnibus spending bill, which would fund the government through Sept. 30, for its $8.3 billion worth of earmarks -- some of which belong to Republicans.

Such arguments, however, have been drowned out by protests from Tea Party activists and other opponents of the projects, who make fun of earmarks like $100,000 obtained by Rep. Jose Serrano, D-N.Y., to renovate the Edgar Allan Poe museum in the Bronx, a cottage where the poet lived for the final three years of his life.

Other senators with earmarks in the bill after voting last month to ban them include Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn.; Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga.; Richard Burr, R-N.C.; Kay Baily Hutchison, R-Texas; Bill Nelson, D-Fla.; and Jeff Sessions, R-Ala.

Even avid earmarker Thad Cochran of Mississippi, the top Republican on the Appropriations Committee -- who obtained almost 300 earmarks totaling more than $500 million -- hasn't explicitly come out in support of the bill, though he's widely expected to vote with Democrats later this week to advance it.

So is Ohio Republican George Voinovich, who's responsible, along with Democratic homestate colleague Sherrod Brown, for 77 earmarks totaling $94 million.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/12/16/senate-scrambles-avoid-government-shutdown-gop-forces-read-thon/


WASHINGTON (AP)—The top Senate Republican has offered a one-page bill to prevent a government shutdown on Saturday as an alternative to a 1,924-page catchall spending measure offered by Democrats.
Kentucky Republican Mitch McConnell says it's unbelievable that Democrats want to pass the measure in just a few days as Christmas approaches. He says Congress should pass a less costly bill next year—when Republicans will have more leverage.
McConnell had earlier quietly backed the effort to produce the nearly $1.3 trillion bill, but he's now trying to kill it. McConnell also obtained $85 million in so-called earmarks for Kentucky.
Democrats say they'll take up the bill later Thursday. It bankrolls every Cabinet agency for the budget year that started Oct. 1.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9K5BA5O0&show_article=1