Rep. Jim McDermott: Obama's Tax Deal Good For Trust Fund Babies, 'Unfair' To The Unemployed

Democratic Congressman Jim McDermott (D-Wash) called President Obama's tax cut deal "unfair" on Sunday, during an appearance with fellow Congressman Elijah Cummings (D-MD) on CNN's "State of the Union," and accused the president of not being serious about helping the unemployed.

"If you just take one specific issue to show the unfairness of this, you have two groups of people in this country who do not have jobs," McDermott told host Candy Crowley: "You have trust fund babies and you have the unemployed."

Obama's tax cut deal "gives $68 billion to the trust fund babies with security, it's going to last two years. To the unemployed, he gives $56 billion," McDermott continued. "It's going to go for a year, and then it's sort of up to the Republican-controlled Congress to go into the second year."

"If he were serious about this unemployed, he would have put in two years, he would have demanded that he have two or three years of unemployment, because [Federal Reserve Chairman Ben] Bernanke is saying we're going to have high unemployment for the next five years. It's not going away. And any avoidance of that is simply not caring about the unemployed in this country."

McDermott's comments echoed those he made to HuffPost's Arthur Delaney last week. "One year of unemployment benefits for two years of tax breaks for the rich? What kind of deal is that?" said McDermott on Wednesday. "The rich get everything they wanted."

WATCH:

Comments

[senseandnonsense]

06:49 AM on 12/14/2010

“I've finally roped-a-do­pe. I've quoted Theodore Roosevelt, a Republican president. Thanks for reading my post!

A little learning is a dangerous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring.”

Justice Goodyear 20 hours ago (10:42 AM) 126 Fans

You are so funny. Theodore Roosevelt was not republican - at least not by today's standards. By the way, he was scary and so are you.

Senseandnonsense:
George Bush's favorite President!

[Maureen Mower]

03:50 PM on 12/13/2010

A new idea for job creation & tax cuts: The HIRE, TRAIN & RETAIN Act proposal: http://t.co/hRmzxkd

Please read, and if you find it has merit, pass it on to your elected representatives TODAY, before this disasterous deal Obama made gets any further traction.

[CMontalvo]

01:00 PM on 12/13/2010

It's hard to tell whether the Democratic opposition to the compromise is driven more by 1) opposition to the terms, 2) the insult of being left out of the negotiations or 3) giving yet another win to those same folks who defeated so many Democrats in November.

I'm betting that all three are at play. In any case, it looks like passage is a certainty.

[wrightj]

12:45 PM on 12/13/2010

Rep. McDermott is correct. This bill is a disaster any which way you look at it. It does what it should not do and that which it should do it doesn't. It is 100% wrong. And using the unemployed as a bargaining chip is not just cowardly and cruel but unethical and immoral. GOP are really really delusionally sick to not see that. The 2% payroll tax for me at $55k a year amounts to $1.75 per week as a stimulous, while the rich get $100k or more a year. My $1.75 is not even bread crumbs compared to what the rich would get. And the 2% cut would jeopardize SS and medicare in the future. What heinious diabolical people thought this bill up?

[seawillow]

12:04 PM on 12/13/2010

Liberal problem here is collateral damage: Paris Hilton is standing among a bunch of the innocent heirs of family farms. The ordinance you lob at one wounds both.

[MiddleForkedRoad]

12:02 PM on 12/13/2010

The estate tax at 35% seems fair.
50% is robbery.

[CMontalvo]

01:04 PM on 12/13/2010

But robbery is the only thing we can use to eliminate the wealth gap. What else are we supposed to do...WORK to earn our wealth???

[Patchdee]

04:49 PM on 12/13/2010

And how many of the uber-wealthy robbed the poor to get their riches? Ever hear of Bernie Madoff, Ken Lay and hundreds of others who were never caught or got off with a slap on the rich? What about all the CEO's who siphoned off all the cash from their companies and then moved to Florida where they could keep all the stolen money? I know because I was working for one of them when he moved to Florida! He owed me close to $10K in sales commissions when he closed the doors.

[ran6110]

11:54 AM on 12/13/2010

Now watch once they cut the money going in to Social Security (the lower tax rate in this 'deal') they'll say there isn't enough money and it needs to be 'properly invested' by wall street.

Wall street and the Republicans have been dying to get their hands on the Social security fund's money for a very, very long time...

Oh, and of course if wall street mismanages the funds money they will still get their money and bonuses while the taxpayer foot that bill also!

[pickles n pops]

04:44 PM on 12/13/2010

Having eviscerated Medicare with his appointments and funding cuts, that will affect the quality of health care that will be available to seniors, O'Bama's workin on performing the same miracle to Social Security.

[ran6110]

05:07 PM on 12/13/2010

Yup, very well said..

F&F

[unique]

11:53 AM on 12/13/2010

WikiLeaks that is now on line has some 500 papers from
the Bank Of Iceland, it is interesting to see 500 some odd
pages of people and corporations that are American trying
to get the money back from the failed bank that they hid in
Iceland Bank accounts they did not pay taxes on.

[Patchdee]

11:35 AM on 12/13/2010

"The rich get everything they wanted." Well not everything. If the rich could have their way they would have ALL the money and the rest of us would be serfs like in the good old days in Russia under the Czars.

[vulpecula762mm]

12:01 PM on 12/13/2010

It didnt end well for the Czars.

[Patchdee]

04:53 PM on 12/13/2010

I agree, but the people who most need to learn the lessons of history are usually the ones who care the least. "It'll never happen to me" is their logic. Besides, when the US is reduced to a third world nation they figure that they will have enough money to hire personal bodyguards to protect their gated estates. For them, enough money can protect them from bad things.

[PalmG]

11:35 AM on 12/13/2010

I am not a fan of the estate tax, not a fan of punishing people (or their heirs) for their prosperity in their death. However, I am also not a fan of Bush's ridiculous tax cuts that drove our economy out of surplus into record deficit. Seems like there could be a way to end the estate tax and the Bush recession-inducing tax cuts (to everyone btw, not just the wealthy.)

They always seem to fight over the wrong things in Washington...if they fight at all that is.

[TooManyThings]

11:33 AM on 12/13/2010

All of our futures would be more secure if everyone around the world would stop squirting out babies. Just because you can does not mean you have too.

[unique]

11:48 AM on 12/13/2010

A lot of men think it is macho to make a baby.

A lot of women think he will marry her if she has his baby.

A lot of people should be sterilized so they will not have babies that they can not care for.

Any dog can make a baby.

[ran6110]

11:57 AM on 12/13/2010

Let me guess, you and TooManyThings are just the right people to decide who get to have children...

[David Parillo]

11:53 AM on 12/13/2010

You should only replace the two who will be leaving the planet with two. It is very simple and sustainable.

[masanf]

11:33 AM on 12/13/2010

The unemployed in this country can get benefits for up to 99 weeks, essentially two years. These benefits are have been extended for two years. I am getting sick and tired of people like McDermott acting like people who are getting two years worth of checks are so put upon, so downtrodden and mistreated by the government. The unemployment insurance program in this country was not meant to be a long-term welfare program.

[colgan]

12:03 PM on 12/13/2010

Being on long term unemployment is a lot better for the economy than long-term welfare which is where the unemployed will end up when their UI runs out. At least while on UI taxes are being paid. This will not happen on welfare/social services.

[shwicksdad]

05:06 PM on 12/13/2010

Another person so overflowing with resentment they have no clue what it is they are even bellyaching about...
 
No currently pending bill provides for more than 99 weeks total...
 
No extension that has been approved in the last 12 months has ever provided for more than that 99 weeks.
 
Federal benefits, which you seem to have SUCH an issue with, last only 53 week maximum.
 
During the period Oct 2008 through December of 2009, US employers laid off over 5,900,000 people. The trend of avtually hiring more people than were being laid off did not reverse until May of 2010. In 2010, private industry has created LESS than 1,000,000 jobs to replace the 5,900,000 lost. During the majority of the unemployed's "99 weeks", US companies were laying off over 13,000 people a day, seven days a week. Every week these people looked for work, US companies laid off another 90,000 people.

[masanf]

11:29 AM on 12/13/2010

"One year of unemployment benefits for two years of tax breaks for the rich? What kind of deal is that."

Again, letting people keep more of the fruits of their own labor is not even remotely the same as giviing people money (that was taken from working taxpayers who actually contribute) they didn't earn.

[Patchdee]

11:41 AM on 12/13/2010

And what about all of the jobs that the rich shipped overseas? I don't call that the "fruit of their own labor" - I call that "stealing the fruit trees" so there is no "fruit" for the fruit pickers to pick!

The unemployed fruit pickers contributed into the system - they are being paid from that fund. Your argument is the same as "why should the guy that paid into his life insurance policy all his life profit for it when he dies? Isn't he just taking money from the non-dead who are paying their insurance?

[ran6110]

11:58 AM on 12/13/2010

Actually, I expecting next year for them to find a way out of the unemployment extension...

That was just something to hold as ransom to get the the rich what they want...

[masanf]

11:27 AM on 12/13/2010

The unemployed have been getting benefits they didn't earn for up to 99 weeks. The tax cut bill allows that to happen for 13 more months. I guess McDermott wants the unemployed to be able to get checks without working for 2.5 years or maybe 3 years. I don't care how harsh it sounds, but if you haven't worked for 2 years, you don't deserve a single cent more. The extension of unemployment benefits in this bill, to allow more people to get benefits for up to 99 weeks, is more than enough.

Moreover, as far as the estate tax is concerned, that money has already been taxed at least once, and probably more. The notion that a tax cut is the same as actually giving people they didn't earn is ridiculous. There is something wrong with the belief that an individual's death should be a taxable event. The estate tax has absolutely nothing to do with raising revenue and everything to do with pure envy.

[GonzoFL]

11:34 AM on 12/13/2010

Your compassion for the unemployed is overwhelming. Maybe you will have the opportunity to be unemployed soon....then let's see you pull your foot out of your mouth zippy.

[Alg0rhythm]

12:42 PM on 12/13/2010

Unemployment should be changed without a doubt... it should become a part time work program, with work preferably being of the same sort they are used to, maybe 20 hours a week after the first month or two. If nothing locally was available in their talents, well, people can learn new skills....

[Peter Combs]

11:27 AM on 12/13/2010

Railing in favor of adding to the Estate Tax is opium for the masses...makes them all feel better and does nothing for them.....when the "have nots" exceed the "haves"..the "haves" leave..and take the money with them.