Janice Schakowsky: “I do not doubt for a minute that the Republicans would have been perfectly happy, probably preferred, to go home for a…”

“I do not doubt for a minute that the Republicans would have been perfectly happy, probably preferred, to go home for a week letting unemployment benefits expire; give tax cuts to the rich today, that is the number one priority, $350 billion, most of which goes to the richest Americans, and zip to the unemployed. Actually, they did it at Christmastime, right before Christmas, let those benefits expire. But after the Democrats pushed and pushed, and maybe there was some polling done, they decided to not only do something for the Bush class but to do something for the middle class and for the unemployed workers, $5 billion compared to $350 billion. Okay, we are grateful for that. But over a $100,000 tax cut to Secretary of the Treasury Snow and still zero dollars for the more than one million workers who are still out of work, 53,000 in Illinois. Some over on the other side of the aisle have fretted about, oh, unemployment benefits, they just encourage people to stay home and not look for a job. How dare they? These people want a job, and this administration and its economic plan has been nothing but a job-killer, a job-killer. We have seen the loss of over 2.5 million jobs since this President has come in. The economy is going down. These people want to work. People in my own family who have been laid off, they want nothing more than a good job. These people do not want unemployment insurance benefits.”