Today, the Senate passed a $15 billion jobs bill (with the help of a group of Republicans who voted for the measure after voting to filibuster it two nights ago), so the upper chamber is now set to move onto other economic measures, including a much-needed extension of unemployment benefits.

The stimulus package passed last year ensured unemployment benefits through the end of 2009, which Congress then extended through the end of this month. But 1.1 million workers are now scheduled to lose their benefits in March, and with the deadline looming some states are already sending letters informing the recipients that they are at the end of the line.

So all the signs point toward expedience in addressing this problem, and Reid is reportedly pursuing a one-year extension so that this same scenario doesn’t arise again in a few months. But it’s unclear whether or not the Republicans are going to lend the effort any support, with Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) saying that the GOP is “concerned about the high cost” of any extension.

With that in mind, it’s worth remembering how Senate Republicans responded the last time that an extension was needed. Not only did they repeatedly block the measure from even coming to the Senate floor for weeks on end, but they also attempted to attach all manner of unrelated items to the bill, including provisions related to ACORN and immigration. To top it all off, when the final vote on extending benefits finally came, the measure passed 98-0.

Earlier this month, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) blocked a simple stop-gap extension that would have moved the expiration of benefits back a week because he was upset at Reid for discarding a jobs bill that Sens. Max Baucus (D-MT) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) had negotiated.

“It doesn’t represent what this Senate ought to be about and for goodness’ sakes, it doesn’t represent the kind of bipartisanship that was always behind voting for unemployment benefits,” said Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), regarding the GOP’s actions. “This Republican obstruction, when it comes to something this basic, is fundamentally unfair.”

“It is critical for Congress to extend these benefits through all of 2010,” said Christine Owens, Executive Director of the National Employment Law Project. “Clearly, workers need continued support while our economy meets the tall order of creating of nearly 11 million jobs to bring employment back to prerecession levels.” So will the GOP play politics with the extension again or let the non-controversial and necessary measure come to the floor?

This morning, the Senate passed a $15 billion jobs bill that includes four provisions: a payroll tax break for hiring unemployed workers, an extension of highway construction funding, Build America bonds to help states fund infrastructure projects, and an extension of tax breaks for equipment purchase. The final vote for passage was 70-28, with 13 Republicans joining all but one Democrat in voting yea.

But this vote only occurred because on Monday night 5 Republicans joined the same group of Democrats in order to invoke cloture and overcome a filibuster by a 62-30 vote. Below are the Republicans who either voted against or did not vote at all on the cloture motion, but flipped and voted for the bill today.

NAY TO YEA	ABSENT TO YEA
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN)	Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC)
Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS)	Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT)
Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK)
Sen. George LeMieux (R-FL)
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK)
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS)

In addition to this flip-flop, all the above senators except Inhofe voted to sustain a Republican objection on a point of order before proceeding to the final vote. Plus, I noted two days ago that both Inhofe and Hatch were planning to vote against cloture despite the bill including provisions of which they have been extremely supportive. Inhofe followed through with his nay vote on cloture, while Hatch skipped the vote entirely, but both came around to support the bill today.

After the vote, Alexander said that he voted for the final bill “because it is modest.” “There are plenty of opportunities for bipartisan cooperation,” he said, which of course begs the question regarding why he couldn’t engage in bipartisan cooperation just two days ago if he supported the bill.

The bill now moves to the House of Representatives, which last year passed a far more ambitious $154 billion jobs creation package. Earlier today, Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) predicted that the House will pass the Senate bill as is.

According to reports in both the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post, the “Volcker rule” — which would bar banks from trading for their own benefit with federally insured deposits — is facing resistance in the Senate and will likely be watered down, if it’s included at all, in the regulatory reform proposal that Senate Banking Chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT) hopes to unveil next week. Dodd has been negotiating with Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) in an attempt to craft a proposal that can garner bipartisan support, and the two have been saying that the Volcker rule is not being discussed much.

A few weeks ago, Dodd signaled that he may drop the Volcker rule outright as a way to pick up some Republican support for the wider bill. But interestingly, Republicans on the banking committee don’t seem to have any problem with the concept behind the Volcker rule:

– A spokesman for Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) said that Shelby “supports the spirit of the Volcker rule,” but he is “not convinced that the proposal itself is necessary.”

– Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) said that “conceptually” the Volcker rules makes sense, but that Treasury is “having trouble putting their arms around it.”

Why then, if both sides support the idea, would it be dropped? Instead of implementing the Volcker rule, the tide seems to be moving in favor of allowing regulators to ban proprietary trading at banks on a case-by-case basis, if the regulators deem that the trading is posing a threat to the health of a particular bank.

That approach might work if regulators are actually on their game, but the last crisis proved that regulators have a tendency to turn a blind eye to practices that lead to big bank profits. For instance, the Federal Reserve had the capability to regulate mortgage lending in the lead-up to the subprime crisis, but did nothing, while other regulators actively exempted firms from rules aimed at reining in their lending practices. Counting fully on diligent regulators can lead to catastrophe, especially if you have someone like President Bush appointing them, since he sought regulators who would be lax on the enforcement side.

This week, five former Treasury Secretaries endorsed the Volcker rule in a letter to the Wall Street Journal. “We fully understand that the restriction of proprietary activity by banks is only one element in comprehensive financial reform. It is, however, a key element in protecting our financial system and will assure that banks will give priority to their essential lending and depository responsibilities,” they wrote.

“For any reform to be effective, it is important that we go back to separating, in some function or other, the normal banking activities of commercial banks from the trading activities,’’ said W. Michael Blumenthal, who was Treasury Secretary under President Carter. “The mixing of those two has gotten us into trouble, and it’s important to fix it.” Former Citigroup CEO John Reed agreed, saying that “the industry should be compartmentalized so as to limit the propagation of failures.”

Yesterday, the White House pushed back on reports that it was open to watering down the Volcker rule. “We’re as committed to that now as we were on that day,” the White House press secretary, Robert Gibbs, said yesterday. “We’re not walking away from what the president outlined on the Volcker rule.” If that’s true, they might want to get the message to the Senate.

If Democrats move to pass health care reform after tomorrow’s summit, their newfound momentum can be at least partly attributed to WellPoint’s decision to drastically increase premiums in California’s individual health insurance market. The rate increases highlighted the broken health care system and pressured lawmakers to drastically reform the individual health insurance market. The administration’s strong response also enunciated the differences in lawmakers’ approach to reform and may have pushed the President to add stronger cost control provisions into his health care blue-print.

WellPoint’s hikes created a political opportunity for reform, but California policy holders aren’t the only ones experiencing drastic rate increases. A new survey from the Center for American Progress Action Fund has found that “double-digit hikes have been implemented or are pending in at least 11 other states among the 14 where WellPoint’s Blue Cross Blue Shield companies are active: California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Indiana, Maine, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, Virginia, and Wisconsin.” Below is a sample:

– California: Average rates are expected to increase 25 percent in 2010, with increases as high as 39 percent for some policyholders.

– Colorado: Average rates are expected to increase 19.9 percent in 2010, with increases of up to 24.5 percent for some policyholders.

– Indiana: Rates are expected to increase 21 percent in 2010.

– Maine: Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield requested a 23 percent increase for 2010 after five straight years of double-digit increases for individual policyholders. Anthem is suing the Maine Insurance Commissioner for rejecting its request last year for an 18.5 percent rate hike and allowing a 10.9 percent increase.

– Ohio: Average individual rates are expected to decline 40 percent in 2010 due to a new state law that went into effect in 2010.

Hikes are the kind of thing that bring lofty political rhetoric about the need for reform into reality for millions of Americans. More importantly, they could convince those who already have coverage to pressure their lawmakers on reform. This morning, House members will have an opportunity to question WellPoint CEO Angela Braly about the rate hikes when she appears before the Energy and Commerce Committee. But let’s hope they use this report to do more than just talk.

Cross-posted on The Wonk Room.