Good for Senator Jerry Moran.  President Obama was quick to support this legislation, and establishment Republicans were quick to compromise.  It extends President Bush’s 2001 tax cuts for merely two years.  It also extends unemployment benefits for a year, but it provides no way of paying for those benefits, so it adds to the national debt.

Conservative leader Mike Pence voted against the bill, along with Senator Moran.

The Eldorado Times quotes Moran:

“This legislation fails to address our nation’s most serious problem. Our country’s national debt, caused by decades of overspending and expansion of the federal government, is the greatest threat to our nation’s economy and our citizens’ well-being,” Moran said.

Topeka Capital-Journal:

Tiahrt and Jenkins said extension of Bush tax cuts would provide short-term help for businesses and spur hiring of new workers, as well as buy time for Congress to reform the tax code.

Rep. Dennis Moore, D-Kan., and Sens. Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts, both Kansas Republicans, voted for the bill.

The House approved the legislation 277-148, with 112 Democrats and 36 Republicans voting no. The Senate passed the bill 81-19.

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A good article by The Wall Street Journal.  Future US House Speaker John Boehner will be pressuring all Republicans to support raising the federal debt ceiling above its current — and staggering — $14.3 trillion level.  I feel good about how Reps-elect Tim Huelskamp and Mike Pompeo will, but I’m unsure about the rest of Kansas’ delegation to Washington.

But some of the incoming Republicans, such as Rep.-elect Tim Scott of South Carolina, a rising party star, have made it clear they wouldn’t support raising the debt limit because of their concern about federal spending.

“The vote will garner a lot of attention and provoke a lot of pain and anxiety, but there are consequences to all votes,” Mr. Scott said. “The question is, when are we going to stop the way we are going? I think we have to stop it now.”
……

Former Sen. Alan Simpson (R., Wyo.), who co-chairs the presidential deficit commission, predicted the fight to raise the debt limit would be brutal. “There will be hair and eyeballs all over the floor,” he said.

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