David Obey: “Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, as chairman of the Income Security and Family Support Subcommittee, I've spent the last 6…”

“Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, as chairman of the Income Security and Family Support Subcommittee, I've spent the last 6 months fighting for passage of the emergency unemployment extension. The American people needed a helping hand back in January when I introduced the legislation, and they need it now more than ever. Just the other day, my home State of Washington reported the largest 1-month increase in unemployment in 28 years. The unemployment rate spiked in just 1 month from 4.7 to 5.3 percent. We saw much the same happen at the national level. Yet for all the evidence, all the objective data, we saw the White House order Senate Republicans to drag their feet until the President got his way. Last week, the House voted overwhelmingly to pass emergency unemployment on its own merits. We achieved a two-thirds vote in here, veto-proof. So what did the President do? He ordered the Senate Republicans to withhold help from the Americans until he could force Congress to cut out the extra help needed in badly hit States like Michigan, Alaska, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, California and the District of Columbia. Today we're going to get the best that we can get from a lame duck President and the Senate Republicans. John McCain must have written off Michigan and California.”