Word: voting
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...alternative energy, relief for the growing pool of people subject to the alternative minimum tax, disaster assistance for states affected by Midwestern floods and Hurricane Ike, and a provision raising the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation's ceiling of guaranteed deposits to $250,000. And the initial no vote gave many members facing unhappy constituents so close to an election cover to vote for the second bill. "In this game, part of the way of winning is losing to get there," says Bruce Josten, a vice president at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which represents 3 million U.S. businesses...
Coming after two weeks that have only further dimmed Americans' view of Congress, the successful vote was a cause more for relief than for celebration. Legislators can only hope that voters will soon forget the unprecedented financial and political crisis, in which a lame-duck Administration desperate to get an emergency package passed had barely any sway with a Congress seemingly paralyzed by fear of the impending elections. There was that White House meeting a week ago, which some thought would be a photo op with presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain to announce a bipartisan deal, but which...
Even then, though, the changes were not enough to persuade House GOP members - only 37% of whom voted for the measure, compared with 60% of Democrats - and the bill failed, sending the stock market into a tailspin. "The calls to our office before that vote were universal nos," says Representative Michael Conaway, a Texas Republican, one of 26 Republicans who switched his vote. "After the vote, I started getting calls from constituents saying, 'Oh my God, that was the wrong vote; I thought you were voting yes' - particularly from small businesses and people who lost a lot in retirement savings...
...deal with the crisis - even briefly threatening to skip the first presidential debate unless the gridlock was resolved. He backed up House minority leader John Boehner when he balked at the first bill and pledged to help convince unhappy House Republicans - a pledge that clearly fell short when the vote failed. It didn't help McCain's standing that he initially insisted that any final deal contain no earmarks, only to reluctantly vote for a package that was stuffed with pork in order to win enough support...
Obama, who mostly stayed away from the negotiations and argued that the injection of presidential politics would only complicate the process, worked the phones in the final days to help push 33 Democrats into changing their votes to ease final passage. While Democrats praised Obama for getting more members to come on board, Republicans - who only last week had credited McCain with at least bringing House Republicans to the bargaining table - had little good to say about their candidate. Obama was praised nine times in the Democratic press conference following the vote; McCain was not once mentioned...