We are ruled by adults

Mother Jones' Kevin Drum looks at what it took to pass a simple extension of unemployment benefits for the 10.2% of Americans who consider canned beans a luxury.

Democrats only had to break three separate filibusters in the Senate to get this passed! The first filibuster was broken by a vote of 87-13, the second by a vote of 85-2, and the third by a vote of 97-1. The fourth and final vote, the one to actually pass the bill, was 98-0. Elapsed time: five weeks for a bill that everyone ended up voting for.

Why? Because even though Republicans were allowed to tack on a tax cut to the bill as the price of getting it passed, they decided to filibuster anyway unless they were also allowed to include an anti-ACORN amendment. Seriously. A bit of ACORN blustering to satisfy the Palin-Beck crowd is the reason they held up a bill designed to help people who are out of work in the deepest recession since World War II. Details here and here. That's called taking governing seriously, my friends.

So in order to extend a measure that everyone supported, Democrats had to add in a first-time homebuyer credit that basically adds to our problems in the housing market in an attempt to prop it up and enact a tax-cut shenanigan that allows small-businesses to engage in shadier accounting practices. All to pass a bill slightly faster so that hundreds of thousands of extra people wouldn't go broke while they dicked around.

...AND THE HOOOOOOOME OF THE BRAAAAAAVE! Makes you glad to be an American.