In the spirit of the holiday season, President Barack Obama's tax-cut deal with Republicans is nice-looking a Christmas tree tinseled with gifts for lobbyists and lawmakers. But that hardly stopped the internal strife on Friday, with Bill Clinton even back at the White House importunate the president's case.
While Republicans sat back silently, mostly pleased, Democrats and other liberals were going at each other ever so publicly. As Clinton lecture on Obama's behalf, Vermont self-sufficient Bernie Sanders castigate the accord for the TV cameras in the mostly empty Senate chamber.
The tax deal, reach at the back the scenes and still informal, now include ethanol subsidies for rural folks, commuter tax breaks for their cousins in the cities and suburbs and wind and solar grants for the environmentalist — all aimed at winning votes, particularly from disinclined Democrats.
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