what congress is going to do to help them. fred, the president is trying to drum up support. now, in a statement the white house said, quote, the president as well as the democratic congressional leadership has made clear the importance of extending the benefits immediately upon congress retu return. this tees up a nasty fight for the new year. some republican ps say it s time to end the program altogether. they argue it s too expensive. a year s extension costs about $25 billion. people have gotten dependent. and they say the economy is strong enough now without them. now, here s a little preview of what the tough love argument will hear from some republicans. it s long been known that they re going to expire. people should have been making the tough decisions they needed to make to find a job. and the problem when the welfare state gets too expansive is that people tend to depend too much on government. the message for the future i
when you combine everything together, the cuts amount to $801 billion. but if you recall, in a deal to get the cuts, the government wanted to extend unemployment benefits for those people for whom it was expiring. the benefits extension costs about $57 billion. so you add it together, you ve got $858 billion. that s a pretty hefty bill. and you re probably wondering what we re getting for our money. let me tell you. it s going to cost $544 billion for the two-year extension of the cuts themselves. that s the big one. but then you start adding on the payroll tax holiday. that s going to cost $11 billion. another $8 billion for tax breaks for low and middle-income earners, which includes credits for kids and their college costs. doesn t stop there. there s also business tax breaks, including those for research and some energy credits, even a measure that will allow businesses to write off 100% of their expenses in
more than 200,000 americans are days away from losing their jobless benefits. senators headed home for a two-week break without a deal, after republicans balked at extending the benefits without cutting other spending. the extension costs about $10. a month. no deal means those individuals getting state jobless benefits won t be able to apply for additional federal help, and those receiving federal checks could be cut off. crews in maryland are on the scene of a train derailment, they are trying to clean up several hundred gallons of fuel. check out the front of the coltrane, you see it there, it apparently failed to stop on the raised bridge and ended up be hanging off the tracks. officials expect to be cleaning up all weekend, officials are investigating the cause. federal authorities reduced charges for four men from entering senator mary landrieu s office, and the activist james o keefe is among those facing misdemeanor charges. they were originally faced with felonies. the two