Posted on 02/09/2011 2:10:35 PM PST by La Lydia
The House on Wednesday rejected a Republican-led effort to force the United Nations to give back $179 million in overpayments, falling short in the face of Obama administration arguments that much of the money already had been designated to boost security around an international headquarters susceptible to terrorist attack. The vote was 259-169, short of the two-thirds necessary for the bill to pass. It was the third straight embarrassment for the new House Republican leadership, which lost votes on the Patriot Act extension Tuesday night and was forced to pull a trade bill or suffer defeat.
Determined to cut spending, Republicans had pushed for the legislation that would recoup $179 million from the U.N. Tax Equalization Fund, which was established to pay American employees of the U.N. who have to pay taxes when their foreign counterparts do not. The measure also would have required the Unites States to withhold an equivalent amount from future U.N. dues if the money were not repaid.
The State Department said the money simply can't be returned, as $100 million had been set aside for the New York City police department to upgrade security around the building, which overhangs the heavily trafficked FDR Drive....
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., chairwoman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, said the measure was necessary because the U.N. had collected more from the United States than it had paid out and American taxpayers should get their money back.
"This is not about security," said Ros-Lehtinen, who argued that the U.N. and the administration were looking for another excuse to avoid making tough choices....
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
The GOP “Young Guns” are starting to remind me of “The Three Amigos”.
Why would it require a 2/3 vote?
$100,000,000 for security upgrades? Concrete barriers and german shepherds sure are pricey. I'm not that stupid.
Let's see the votes?
Can’t this be brought up later under regular order negating the 2/3 vote requirement?
Why, why can’t we ever get those parasites off our back?
We have too many GOP who are Liberal Globalists....
Anyone who whines about “Isolationism”, “Protectionism” and promote Free Trade Communism....is going to support the UN. All of the above are part of the UN/Globalist agenda....and anyone pushing the aforementioned is going to support the UN...no matter how “patriotic” or “Pro-American” they claim to be.
There are many good pro-American House members....it is just too many are America-Hating Globalists. In both parties
Well...then I suppose we're suppose to give up then right?
The message is clear: There's no hope; you dweebs that elected these 'tea party' types are going to be beat into submission. See what a mistake it was for you to vote for them? Just give up now and the world will be a happier place.
I guess it takes a 2/3rds vote because the GOP is the majority.
Thats all I can figure.
Something to do with a suspension of the rules.
See Outlaw Woman’s post above yours.
The Republican Leadership appears to be working with the D-Rats - all to help put down the Tea party Folks. Stick the stuff we want on a 2/3rds bill and say “Well it failed to get the votes required.
Business as usual
If the UN can’t fix Egypt (/rhet), it needs to be moved to Harare Zimbabwe.
Right.
The RINO-Democrat Alliance Wins Again
It requires a 2/3 vote to suspend of the rules to fast-track this. This vote will come up again under the regular rules, and there will be enough votes to pass it, at least in the House.
The explanation of why 2/3 on the Patriot Act extension ‘failure’ was they were trying to fast track it under suspension of the rules that would otherwise allow amendments and other stalling tactics. I suspect this is the same. The multiplicity of these suggests the leadership is trying to get as much of their agenda done as quickly as possible, but is having problems with accuracy of their whip’s vote counting. They have the 1/2 majority. They can, and at least with the Patriot Act extension already have, re-file the bill under normal rules and win, at the time cost of Rat stalling. Do a bunch of these, win just a few and they may come out ahead on time. If I’m correct this isn’t the bad news the media is spinning, but rather evidence our new majority can be hard to predict (including with whip counts) and needs to improve their PR. Neither should be great surprises, nor, granting improvement on the latter, great worries.
Hardly! They aren't going to win in these expedited cases where the rule requires 2/3 majority, but they are getting Dems on record with the votes. They can come back later and get what they want under the normal majority rule.
Not everything needs to be done today. They will eventually get what they want, but this way they inflict a little damage along the way.
No, it is because they are bringing these things up under and expideted rule rather than the normal process. It is the leadership using the rules to their advantage, putting the Dems in a position of voting against something that will be hard to defend later. They use small specific amendments to do this. Although they lose the vote overall, they DEM votes can be used against them later. The GOP can then just come back with the amendment under the normal rule and pass it with a simple majority.
Because the GOP elite would rather lose and claim the conservative mantle than actually pass something conservative.
Are you referring to the “Three Young Eunuchs?”
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.