Games

I love it when the majority party in power of the wealthiest, most developed country on Earth decides to play games with poor people.

Republican leaders are willing to allow the first minimum wage increase in a decade but only if it's coupled with a cut in inheritance taxes on multimillion-dollar estates, lawmakers said Friday.

As the House pointed toward a session stretching past midnight, it was anything but certain that the plan would work. In fact, the move seemed unlikely to result in a hike in the minimum wage, which has been frozen at $5.15 per hour for a decade.

Republicans hoped to put Democrats in the uncomfortable position of voting against the minimum wage increase and the estate tax cut — and an accompanying bipartisan package of popular tax breaks, including a research and development credit for businesses and deductions for college tuition and state sales taxes.

But there was GOP discontent, too. Some conservative in the House were unhappy about the minimum wage vote while moderates in the party were restive about it being tied to cuts in the estate tax.

These are silly little games, only they have real consequences that affect people's lives. To someone making $5 an hour, it's the difference between food and medicine, between a place to live that's safe and one in a slum. To Paris Hilton, it means she can afford that second jet.

And it's completely pointless, since the bill would never even get to the Senate.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., pledged to kill the hybrid minimum wage/tax cut bill if it got to the Senate.

"The Senate has rejected fiscally irresponsible estate tax giveaways before and will reject them again," Reid said. "Blackmailing working families will not change that outcome."

This is so Republicans, scared to death over losing the House, can make campaign ads saying "Democrats voted against the minimum wage!" It's stupid politics to hold poor people up for an honest day's pay so that Paris Hilton can get her tax cut. I didn't see any strings attached to legislative pay raises. This is about as ugly as it gets on the floor of what was once the People's House.

All the more reason to sweep all of these cynical bastards out in November.