It’s no secret that Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) — along with her Republican counterpart, Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) — are on a quest to cut the estate tax, slashing taxes for the heirs of multimillionaires. Instead of reinstating the currently expired estate tax at the 2009 level (45 percent, with a $3.5 million exemption), Lincoln and Kyl want to cut the rate to 35 percent and raise the exemption to $5 million.

As I noted earlier this week, Lincoln and Kyl have been searching for offsets to pay for their tax cut, as if there aren’t a host of better things that we could do with $60-$80 billion. And judging by a quote she gave to The Hill, Lincoln either isn’t entirely clear how the estate tax works or is relying on a false characterization of it to build support:

“I don’t think there’s any American out there who believes you should work all of your life to find that when you die, 55 percent of [your estate] has got to go to the government,” the senator said. “Coming up with more balanced exemptions and rates is critical.”

Lincoln is likely right that Americans don’t think 55 percent of any estate should go to the government upon the owner’s death. Fortunately, that is not a policy that anyone is proposing, nor would it be the case if the estate tax was simply allowed to reset to 2001 levels (as it will if Congress fails to act).

Because the estate tax — like the personal income tax — is calculated on marginal income, the particular percentage is only levied on amounts above the exemption. So if the exemption is $3.5 million, the first $3.5 million of the estate is passed on entirely tax free. Tax is only paid on the first dollar in excess of that. So an estate worth $3,500,001 would have a tax bill of .45 cents under 2009 law.

The effective tax rate — the amount paid as a percentage of the entire estate — owed by people who actually had to pay any estate tax at all in 2009 was about 14 percent. There were no grieving widows who have to hand over half of everything they own to the government.

Lincoln also employed the common conservative argument that “small businesses don’t have the profit margins to survive” a higher estate tax. But virtually no small businesses face the estate tax. In fact, 98 percent of estates pay no estate tax at all (because they don’t come even close to exceeding the exemption). Only 0.2 percent of the money that Lincoln and Kyl want to spend on their tax cut will wind up with actual small businesses. The rest will go towards lowering tax bills for the richest of the rich.

During the debate over health care reform, a favorite Republican tactic was to try slowing down the process by claiming that they were being frozen out by the Democrats, and that none of their ideas were being included in the legislation. This was repeatedly revealed to be completely untrue, as Democrats spent months negotiating with the GOP and included scores of its ideas, but still, the talking point persisted.

Now that financial regulatory reform is inching its way toward the finish line, Republicans may be looking to resurrect the same strategy:

“I think we all realize that there’s no real attempt for a bipartisan bill,” [Sen. Bob] Corker (R-TN) said. “We’re outnumbered.” He said there may be a few Republicans who are satisfied with the bill but he’s “not going to vote for a bad bill.”

Corker was singing a very different tune just a few months ago, when Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT) specifically reopened negotiations with him, after previous talks with the committee’s ranking member, Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL), wound up going nowhere. Dodd then included many of the provisions that he and Corker worked out when he brought his bill to committee markup. He also gave the Republicans ample opportunity to offer amendments during the markup, which the Republicans chose not to do. (Corker later called this a “major strategic error.”)

Even during the amendment process on the Senate floor, Republicans are getting a very fair shake. So far, the Senate has voted on 26 amendments. Of these, 14 were sponsored by Republicans, 9 were sponsored by Democrats/Independents, and 3 had a sponsor from both parties. So 17 of the 26 amendments had Republican backing:

Republican Amendments: Snowe #3755 (passed, voice vote); Snowe #3757 (passed, voice vote); Shelby #3826 (failed, 38-61); Ensign #3869 (failed, 35-59); Vitter #3760 (failed, 37-62); McCain #3839 (failed, 43-56); Corker #3955 (failed, 42-57); Snowe #3918 (passed, voice vote); Chambliss #3816 (failed, 39-59); Crapo #3992 (passed, voice vote); Lemieux #3774 (passed, 61-38); Sessions #3832 (failed, 42-58); Thune #3987 (failed, 40-55); Collins #3879 (passed, voice vote)

Democratic/Independent Amendments: Boxer #3737 (passed, 96-1); Brown #3733 (failed 33-61); Sanders #3738 (passed, 96-0); Dodd #3938 (passed, 63-36); Merkley #3962 (passed, 63-36); Reed #3943 (passed 98-1); Landrieu #3956 (passed, voice vote); Franken #3991 (passed, 64-35); Durbin #3989 (passed, 64-33);

Sponsor From Both Parties: Shelby-Dodd #3827 (passed 93-5); Tester-Hutchison #3749 (passed, 98-0); Hutchison-Klobuchar #3759 (passed, 90-9)

Thus far, 9 Republican-sponsored amendments have been accepted, as well as 11 Democratic sponsored amendments. And let’s not forget, Republicans spent three days filibustering the motion to simply start debate on the bill. Considering the circumstances, Dodd has been extremely accommodating.

In fact, when Dodd decided to begin admonishing other Senators about the plethora of amendments slowing down the bill, he went at members of his own party, dressing down Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND)! There hasn’t been a peep about Sen. Jim DeMint’s (R-SC) attempt to bring up a completely unrelated amendment requiring completion of a border fence.

According to Politico, Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) wants to file cloture on the financial reform bill next week, limiting the remaining debate to 30 hours. But Republicans have said that doing so would be “premature” and “force a showdown.” At this point, though, they only have themselves to blame for sucking up valuable debate time with filibusters and nonsensical amendments.