Senator Jim Bunning's showboating blockade of a 30-day extension of unemployment and health insurance benefits is sure to be overridden this week, but it may have another effect because he also stopped an extension of the Highway Trust Fund:
So, the Department of Transportation as of Monday morning, must furlough 2,000 federal workers. DOT says that number could climb if this stalemate over funding drags on. Employees affected include federal inspectors overseeing highway projects on federal lands. If the inspectors aren't there, the projects must shut down. DOT says that will affect 41 critical construction projects from Alaska to the U.S. Virgin Islands.
"As American families are struggling in tough economic times, I am keenly disappointed that political games are putting a stop to important construction projects around the country," said Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. "This means that construction workers will be sent home from job sites because federal inspectors must be furloughed." ...
Some wonder whether the administration playing its own game of high-stakes political chicken. On Friday, Congressman James Oberstar (D- Minn.), Chairman of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, indicated that furloughs might not be necessary if it appeared that funding might be restored quickly. Department of Transportation officials insisted there is no way to know how quickly Congress will act, and that the department cannot spend money it is not authorized to spend.
The No. 2 Senate Republican, Jon Kyl, told Fox News Sunday night that the extension will pass, even as he sympathized with Bunning's move.
So while it's all but certain that the temporary extension will clear the Senate despite Bunning's objection that it isn't being covered under pay-as-you-go rules, a more permanent extension faces considerable Republican opposition. Thus, while the 1.2 million Americans whose benefits expired at midnight yesterday may get a reprieve, the nearly 5 million whose benefits expire between now June 1 could find themselves in big trouble if a longer extension isn't approved.
This would be bad enough if the number of jobless Americans were being rapidly reduced by economic growth and hope was on the horizon. But most economic analysts see 2010 as being a year of tepid recovery, with only a few hundred thousand of the 8.4 million jobs lost since December 2007 being replaced. While only about 40% of Americans who have been laid off in the Great Recession are covered by unemployment benefits, even those could find themselves up jobless creek with neither boat nor paddle before summer.