Congress must extend these needed unemployment benefits before it goes home for the year. And it must bolster economic growth by preserving tax cuts for our middle class. I’m glad that the House of Representatives voted to do that this week, and I call on the United States Senate to do the same.
— Vice President Joe Biden

The Senate on Saturday blocked _ and most likely doomed _ efforts to end Bush-era tax cuts for the very wealthy while preserving them for people earning up to $1 million.
— David Lightman,
McClatchy Newspapers

While President Obama makes his clandestine flight home from visiting American troops in Afghanistan, Vice President Joe Biden stepped in to record the Weekly Address prior to the Senate vote on tax cuts. Unlike “makeovers,” the “after” leaves much to be desired from the “before.” Was the Senate vote pure political theater? How helpful is it to know where lawmakers stand in theory in a struggling economy? With unemployment ticking up, jobless benefits gone (funding ran out Wednesday) before the Christmas holidays, and a definitive Bah, Humbug! message from lawmakers on their opinion of the poor and middle class, a larger question looms:

Where is the public moral outrage?!?

Biden transcript available here.