Unemployment extension passes!

[Sava]

Originally posted by Albert Speer
Sava:

I was summarizing you fools when I called him a weakling... you idiot Sava... i said that he is a capable man...

No you were being an insulting little ****** when you called him a weakling, just like you are now. I just don't understand why you haven't been perma-banned for the Pro-Nazi stuff you used to post. I guess you should thank the mods and owners of Apolyton for not banning you, because they're much nicer than I am.

[Sava]

See, you know your f*cked when a conservative like Shi, and a liberal like me gang up on you

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Albert Speer
To summarize all of you... Chegitz is a weakling... he is staying unemployed because of forces outside his control... he has no ability to combat these forces and actually get a job... so let's cheer that he is getting benefits for a little while more!

::scratches head::

Speer, I don't think it is an overstatement that you have no clue what you are talking about. Have you any idea how hard it is to find job in his sector (website design)? It's absolutely horrible after the dotcom bust, and most employers think that a 16-year old kid who knows FrontPage is good enough.

Maybe he could get a job at MckeyD's or something, but that would just bum somebody who is less skilled than he is out of one. Besides, why should he stoop to that low?

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Philly ain't representin' the world.

[Imran Siddiqui]

I just find it amusing that people are taking Speer seriously.

[DanS]

Good. Bush gets credit for this.

[ravagon]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Maybe he could get a job at MckeyD's or something, but that would just bum somebody who is less skilled than he is out of one. Besides, why should he stoop to that low?

Getting a low-wage menial job for which one is highly overqualified is generally never a good idea unless one is in truly desperate straits. It doesn't do anything for your confidence and interferes with actually finding something worthwhile...

[Sava]

plus, Speer would come on the forums and berade Che for stealing his job

DanS: yeah its Bush's fault

[Inverse Icarus]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
Philly ain't representin' the world.

thank f*cking GOD

(says the atheist)

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
I just find it amusing that people are taking Speer seriously.

Maybe, maybe not. But why let a chance to *cough* correct *cough* somebody slip away?

[orange]

Originally posted by Jack_www
he said many times that he is looking for a job, but is having problems finding one.

yes. I remember a thread a short while ago on the subject. He and I discussed prospective web jobs for a bit...i was wondering if he had been continuing the search in that sector, or if he had given up on it and gone after something else.

I still believe that, if he spends a day or so going around to local businesses, he should get some bites. It's how I used to make money.

Small businesses have the money to pay, and they're willing to pay - just gotta make a decent presentation and show what having a website can do

Good luck Che.

Speer, you're a moron...have some tact. I don't hear about you working, and your 17 year old ass is more than capable.

[Ted Striker]

Unemployment benefits are not only the right thing to do, they are the practical thing to do.

I have disagreed with most of Communist's (chegitz's) theories and beliefs but I hold him in the highest degree of respect.

Asher and Urban are right, that sector is insanely hard, and I feel bad for those guys, knowing how many people are out there competing for the same spot.

[chequita guevara]

Just for Speer's benefit, I look for work daily and send out probably at least twenty resumes a week. Right now I have one major strike against me, and that's living in a minor job market in the South. One, there aren't many jobs here, and two, few people outside the South want to hire someone from the South. While working for Citibank, we ran up against this anti-Southern bias constantly, as the New York office would constantly spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to have NYC designers create designs for them when they had an extremely talented design team here in Jacksonville. C'est la vie. Lesson for the future, never move to a job market you can't get out of.

Bush Signs Jobless Benefits Extension
Jan 9, 7:42 AM (ET)

By DAVID ESPO

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush signed hastily passed legislation Wednesday extending unemployment benefits for 2.5 million victims of a weak economy, the first accomplishment of a new, Republican-controlled Congress.

Democrats in both the House and Senate complained that the measure fell short of what was needed, but Bush said its enactment "should bring some comfort to those of our fellow citizens who need extra help during the time in which they try to find a job."

The measure extends a federal program that provides 13 weeks of benefits for the unemployed who have exhausted their 26 weeks of state aid. The federal program lapsed on Dec. 28, but the Labor Department said the flow of benefits would continue uninterrupted if legislation were signed into law by Thursday.

Officials said an estimated 750,000 people are immediately affected, plus an additional 1.6 million who are expected to become eligible before the extension expires on June 1.

Workers who qualify for an extra 13 weeks from the federal government receive the same weekly benefit amount that they got in state aid. The average weekly benefit was $249.92, according to the latest Labor Department data.

The average benefit was lowest in Alabama, where jobless workers got $165.03 per week. The highest was in Massachusetts, where the average weekly unemployment benefit was $353.29.

The president placed his signature on the $7.2 billion bill a few hours after it cleared the House on a vote of 416-4. The Senate passed the measure Tuesday on a voice vote.

The lopsided votes masked a politically charged debate in which Republicans claimed credit for helping the jobless as their first order of business in the new Congress, and Democrats accused the GOP majority of acting grudgingly.

"It is important to note that the first piece of important legislation ... helps American families by extending unemployment insurance," said Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill.

Democrats failed in an attempt to win approval for a more generous bill, and said they were unimpressed by the GOP-crafted measure.

"Not just 13 weeks, we need 26 weeks at least," said Democratic Rep. David Scott, a first-term Georgian who was sworn into Congress on Tuesday.

Apart from the unemployment measure, the House unanimously approved legislation during the day granting a 3.1 percent pay raise to federal judges, the same boost that other government employees received on Jan. 1.

The House also used a voice vote to approve legislation to keep the federal government in operation through Jan. 31. Senate passage is expected on Thursday. Current spending authority for many departments and agencies expires on Saturday.

Bush signed the unemployment bill at a meeting with top Republican and Democratic leaders of the House and Senate, his first since the new Congress convened.

The unemployment issue was a blend of old and new business for lawmakers.

Congress adjourned late last year without passing an extension of the federal program, triggering angry protests from Democrats at the time.

At the same time, Rep. Bill Thomas, the California Republican who chairs the House Ways and Means Committee, said the debate was a precursor to a struggle over Bush's proposals to stimulate the economy.

Democrats have already criticized the proposals as heavily tilted toward the rich.

Speaking of Democrats who opposed the jobless aid bill on the floor during the day, Thomas said, "I'm quite sure my colleagues will be opposed to the proposals to stimulate the economy as well. So those will be future battles."

But for now, he said, "We're in a position of having the president sign a bill tomorrow or not sign a bill tomorrow."

Democrats said their proposals - an additional 13 weeks of benefits on top of the current 13 - could easily be accepted by the Senate and signed into law by the president. The change would help the estimated one million unemployed who have already exhausted their extra 13 weeks of benefits. The bid to alter the legislation failed on a vote of 224-202.

"The Republican Party does not care about those million unemployed," contended Rep. Jim McDermott, D-Wash., "because you have the presidency, you have the Senate and you have the House."

In fact, the measure that was sent to Bush's desk was far more generous than Thomas and other GOP leaders were willing to approve late last year, and more than even the Democrats were proposing in November.

The House approved a five-week extension in federal benefits last fall, but only for the jobless in three high-unemployment states.

In the Senate, Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and Don Nickles, R-Okla., reached agreement on an alternative at the time that would have extended the expiring program in all 50 states, through March 31.

Thomas and other House GOP leaders spurned the measure, though, and Congress adjourned.

In the Senate, newly elected Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., sought passage of a five-month extension as the first order of business when the Senate convened on Tuesday. But by then, Democrats in both houses, noting that unemployment has continued to rise, decided to press for additional benefits for jobless people who have already exhausted their 13 weeks of benefits.

"Frankly, it's the least they can do," said House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi of California. "But we can do better."

But Texas Rep. Tom DeLay, House majority leader, said, "nothing is good enough" for Democrats. "I would venture to guess that they would have unlimited unemployment compensation so somebody could stay out of work for the rest of their lives."

Voting against the bill Wednesday were Republican Reps. Jeff Flake of Arizona, Jeff Miller of Florida, Ron Paul of Texas and Scott Garrett of New Jersey.

Note the bolded part. 'T'ain't true, I say. I just called my state unemployment agency for information this morning, and some of the people with whom I spoke were unaware that the law had been passed. Okay, the morning after the law is signed may be a little early to expect a bureaucracy to have assimilated the data and started the wheels rolling on the extensions, but seeing as tomorrow's my last day of benefits, and that one million people nationwide have already lost their benefits, I should expect they'd have been prepared for this. . . . patience chegitz, it's a bureaucracy after all . . .

[Urban Ranger]

Have you considered moving back to Chicago or to NYC?

[chequita guevara]

Takes money, and we're living from check to check. I foolishly listened to one of my coworkers who advised against moving to Southern Florida (where there are quite a few jobs). He said that the pay scale was much worse there than compared with the North. At that time, I had the money to move to another market, but used it up while looking for work before unemployment kicked in (three months after my lay off). In retrospect, I should have hunkered down, but I didn't know I wasn't gonna be able to find work.