aristocrats

I wonder sometimes how many of the millionaires and aristocrats cruising the Senate's halls have ever stood in an unemployment line.

Yesterday Obama's jobs bill went down in the Senate 52-45, with 12 Democrats voting to kill it. Among other things it contained an unemployment benefits extension. From Arthur Delaney at HuffPo:

Lurking beneath deficit concerns, for both Republicans and even some Democrats, is the suspicion that extended unemployment benefits discourage job-seeking. Rep. John Linder (R-Ga.) said last Thursday, for instance, that extended unemployment benefits are "too much of an allure" for people to look for work. Even Senate Democrats who voted in favor of the bill, such as Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), are starting to look toward winding down the programs.

"We have 99 weeks of unemployment insurance," Feinstein said. "The question comes, how long do you continue that before people just don't go back to work at all?" (Note: Diane Feinstein's personal worth is about 75 million dollars.)

Needless to say, no help is forthcoming from Congress for the 99ers, the several million people who will have exhausted all available benefits by the end of the year.

Feinstein, despite her mean-spirited comments, ending up voting for the bill, which is more than you can say for other Dems such as the regrettable Ben Nelson of Nebraska.

Atrios calls this "The Great Shirk," and says As evidenced by growing sentiment in Congress as reflected in DiFi's comments, elites are coming to the conclusion that they are not the failures in this employment crisis, but that people are simply too lazy to find jobs in a world with 9.7% unemployment.

It is very depressing.