While walking down the street one day a US senator is tragically
hit by a truck and dies.
His soul arrives in heaven and is met by St. Peter at the entrance.
"Welcome to heaven," says St. Peter. "Before you settle in, it seems there is a problem. We seldom see a high official around these parts, you see, so we're not sure what to do with you."
"No problem, just let me in," says the man.
"Well, I'd like to, but I have orders from higher up. What we'll do is have you spend one day in h*ll and one in heaven. Then you can choose where to spend eternity."
"Really, I've made up my mind. I want to be in heaven," says the senator.
"I'm sorry, but we have our rules."
And with that, St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down to h*ll. The doors open and he finds himself in the middle of a green golf course. In the distance is a clubhouse and standing in front of it are all his friends and other politicians who had worked with him.
Everyone is very happy and in evening dress. They run to greet him, Shake his hand, and reminisce about the good times they had while getting Rich at the expense of the people.
They play a friendly game of golf and then dine on lobster, caviar and champagne.
Also present is the devil, who really is a very friendly guy who has a good time dancing and telling jokes. They are having such a good time that before he realizes it, it is time to go.
Everyone gives him a hearty farewell and waves while the elevator rises...
The elevator goes up, up, up and the door reopens on heaven where
St. Peter is waiting for him.
"Now it's time to visit heaven."
So, 24 hours pass with the senator joining a group of contented souls moving from cloud to cloud, playing the harp and singing. They have a good time and, before he realizes it, the 24 hours have gone by and St. Peter returns.
"Well, then, you've spent a day in h*ll and another in heaven.
Now choose your eternity."
The senator reflects for a minute, then he answers: "Well, I would Never have said it before, I mean heaven has been delightful, but I think I would be better off in h*ll."
So St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down to h*ll.
Now the doors of the elevator open and he's in the middle of a barren land covered with waste and garbage.
He sees all his friends, dressed in rags, picking up the trash and putting it in black bags as more trash falls from above.
The devil comes over to him and puts his arm around his shoulder. "I don't understand," stammers the senator. "Yesterday I was here andthere was a golf course and clubhouse, and we ate lobster and caviar, drank champagne, and danced and had a great time.
Now there's just a wasteland full of garbage and my friends look miserable.
I'm so tired of hearing how Obama inherited this mess and how the pubs are trying to keep spending to a limit. Well, where were these pubs 8 years ago or 10 years ago? NOW, they say they want to conserve, but as soon as the next bill comes along, they attach more pork to it, just like everyone else.
And then Obama signs it all, even while spouting about controlling the earmarks! Seriously?
If you are a democrat, is there anything that Obama has done that you don't agree with, or perhaps is there a policy that he has kept from the previous admin that you agree with that would be out of the norm for the left?
My answer: I actually agree with the decision exhibited thus far by the Obama administration to keep the "enemy combatant" thing. I think it could serve as useful, however, it should not be abused. In the case of al-Marri I think it was abused, and it should be refined. They have FINALLY brought charges against this guy who has been held in prison since 2003 with no charges, no counsel, nada. I think we need to preserve the right to hold people, but there needs to be some kind of standard for doing so.
Info on case: http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gcdH1vowYGzkkCo-7c8M2imC056Q
If you are a republican is there anything that the Obama administration has done that you DO agree with?
The democrats tried to object to his even reading of his statements yesterday. Guess they were afraid he would sway some votes. This is long, but please read.
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Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, the amendment I have is a product of a lot of work from a number of Senators on this side of the aisle. I especially thank Senator Martinez of Florida, a great leader on this issue, along with Senator Thune, Senator Graham, and many other Senators who have been involved in this discussion. This is an alternative we believe would truly create jobs and stimulate our economy. The total cost is around $421 billion.
I wish, before I describe the amendment--and I know others of my colleagues want to discuss this amendment--I wish to point out it is very clear that public opinion in this country is swinging against the proposal that is now before the Senate and was passed by the other body. They are opposed because they see now in the Senate a $995 billion package which could reach more than $1.2 trillion. Many Americans, certainly now a majority, do not see it as a way to create jobs and to stimulate our economy. They see it loaded down with unnecessary spending programs. They see it, very correctly, with policy changes which deserve extended debate and voting on their own, such as ``Buy American'' provisions, Davis-Bacon, giving Federal workers new whistleblower protections. Some of these policy changes may be laudable, others are not, at least in my view, but all of them deserve debate and discussion rather than being placed in a piece of legislation that is intended to stimulate our economy and create jobs.
I think it is time that we also understand how we got where we are. I have been around this body long enough to recognize that we are now entering the final phase of consideration of this package. Whether it be today or over the weekend or early next week, this bill will be disposed of one way or another by the Senate. So how did we get to where we are today, with a $995 billion package, at least, or $1.2 trillion, or perhaps more than that, with a bill that probably would create, in the view of the administration--and I do not agree with it--3 million jobs, which would mean that each job that is created by it costs the taxpayers $275,000. I do not think many Americans believe that each job created should cost $275,000 of their hard-earned tax dollars.
In fact, the response my office is getting borders on significant anger when we talk about many of the funding programs that are in the stimulus bill. I will go through several of them later on, but $400 million for STD prevention; $40 million to make park services more energy efficient; $75 million for smoking cessation. It is hard to argue that, even though these provisions, many of them, may be worthwhile, they actually create jobs. So we have strayed badly from our original intent of creating a situation in America to reverse the terrible decline and economic ditch in which we find the American economy, to the point we have had spending programs and policy provisions which have nothing to do with stimulating the economy and creating jobs. It may be Government--let me put it this way. It may be legislative activity, possibly, at its worst.
We are offering today an alternative at less than half the cost that we think creates jobs and stimulates the economy. I remind my colleagues, despite the rhetoric about bipartisanship, this bill originated in the House of Representatives, as is constitutionally appropriate. There was no Republican input whatsoever. It passed the other body on a strict party-line basis with the loss of 11 Democrats and came over to this body, where in both the Appropriations and the Finance Committees, almost every Republican amendment was rejected on party lines.
I appreciate very much that the President of the United States came over to address Republican Members of the Senate and Republican Members of the House. The tenor of his remarks I think was excellent. But the fact is, we did not sit down and seriously negotiate between Republican and Democrat. I have been involved in many bipartisan efforts in this body, for many years, that have achieved legislative result. The way you achieve it is not to come over and talk to a body. The answer is to sit down and seriously negotiate and come up with compromises which result in legislation which is good for the country.
That has not happened in this process. Again, the American people are figuring it out. I am confident, because of the way this process has taken place, that gap, which is now 43-37, the majority of the American people opposing this package, will grow.
A majority of the American people still believe we have to stimulate the economy and create jobs. I agree with them. But to spend $1.2 trillion on it, and have no provision for when the economy recovers to put us back on the path of fiscal sanity and stability--as the amendment that I had last night was rejected; we got 44 vote--does not provide the American people with confidence that spending will stop at some time.
One thing they have learned is that spending programs that are initially supposed to be temporary become permanent. They become permanent. That is a historical fact.
So we have initiated nearly $1 trillion--many in new spending, some hundreds of billions of dollars in new spending--with no provision, once the economy has recovered--and the economy will recover in America--this is no path to balancing the budget. Instead, we laid a $700 billion debt on future generations of America in the form of TARP, we are laying $1.2 trillion additional in the form of this bill, and another half a trillion dollars in the omnibus appropriations bill, and then we are told there will be a necessity for another TARP, which could be as much as $1 trillion, because of our declining economy. Yet there has been no provision whatsoever, once the economy recovers, to put us back on a path to balancing the budget and reducing and perhaps eliminating--hopefully eliminating--this debt we have laid on future generations of Americans.
I used to come down to the floor here, and have over the years, and argue against provisions in appropriations bills--which, by the way, has led to corruption. I notice there is another individual staffer who is being charged today, or yesterday, for inappropriate behavior with Mr. Abramoff.
There used to be hundreds of thousands and sometimes thousands. Now, they are in the millions and billions, tens of millions and billions. My how we have grown.
Do we need $1 billion for national security at the Nuclear Security Administration Weapons Activities to create jobs? We may need $1 billion for National Nuclear Security Administration Weapons Activity, but to say it will create jobs and will stimulate the economy is a slender reed.
There is nobody who appreciates more than this person the contribution that Filipino war veterans made to winning the Second World War. We are going to give millions of dollars to those who live in the Philippines. Do not label that as job stimulation.
Smoking cessation is something that we all support. How does $75 million for smoking cessation create jobs within the next years that would justify expenditures of $75 million?
This body, in the name of increasing health care for children, raised taxes by some $61 billion, I guess it is, on tobacco use. So we now hope people will use tobacco in order to pay for insurance for children. But the fact is, $75 million for smoking cessation should be an issue that is brought up separately and on its own. And the list goes on and on and on.
Our proposal--I am grateful for the participation of so many Senators--would allocate approximately $275 billion in tax cuts. It would eliminate the 3.1 percent payroll tax for all employees for 1 year and use general revenues to pay for the Social Security obligation.
It would allocate $60 billion to lower the 10-percent tax bracket to 5 percent for 1 year. It would lower the 15-percent tax bracket to 10 percent for 1 year. It would lower corporate tax brackets from 35 percent to 25 percent for 1 year.
We alarmed the world with the ``Buy American'' provisions which are included in this bill. The reaction has been incredible, and the fact is, jobs flee America for a number of reasons. But one of them is we have the highest business taxes of any nation in the world. We used to have among the lowest.
So if we really want to create jobs in America and attract capital and investment for the United States of America, we need to lower the corporate tax bracket. We need to have accelerated depreciation for capital investments for small businesses. We need to assist Americans in need, there is no doubt about that. There are Americans who are wounded and are hurting today. It is not their fault.
We need to extend the unemployment insurance benefits. That is a $38 billion pricetag. We need to extend food stamps. We need to extend unemployment insurance benefits, make them tax free. That is a $10 billion pricetag. And, of course, we need to provide workers with training and employment. That is a $50 billion cost.
We need to keep families in their homes. We needed, and we did adopt last night, the $15,000 tax credit. But we also need to fund the increase in the fee that servicers receive from continuing a mortgage and avoiding foreclosure. We need to have GSE and FHA conforming loan limits. That is $32 billion. We also, by the way, need to do more in the housing area.
You know, it is interesting in all of these spending proposals we have, there is not one penny for defense, not one penny. Obviously, we are going to have to reset our military. We need to replace the aging equipment that has been used so heavily in Iraq and will be needed in Afghanistan.
We need to improve and repair and modernize the barracks, the facilities and infrastructure that directly support the readiness and training of the Armed Forces. We do not have that in the now $995 billion package that is before us. Obviously, we need to spend money on military construction projects which will create jobs immediately. Those people who say that is not the case, I can provide for the record adequate information that many of our military construction projects could begin more quickly than those that are not on our military bases because of environmental and other concerns.
We need to spend $45 billion on transportation infrastructure. There are grants to States to build and repair roads and bridges, including $10 billion for discretionary transportation grants, and $1 billion for roads on Federal lands. Public transit, obviously, we need to fund, and airport infrastructure improvements are necessary, along with small business loans. That is about $63 billion in our proposal.
Finally, the American people believe, and I think correctly, spending is out of control in our Nation's Capital. We continue to spend and spend and spend. We not only have accumulated over a $10 trillion deficit, this will add another $1 trillion or more. I mentioned the TARP of $700 billion, all of which is being paid for--we are printing money in order to fund it.
At some point we are going to have to get our budget balanced or our children and our grandchildren are going to pay the bill. I recommend that this body hear as much as possible from David Walker, former head of the Government Accountability Office, in the Congress of the United States. He paints a stark picture. In my view, it is also time that we establish entitlement commissions: one for Social Security and one for Medicare-Medicaid and make recommendations so we can act on what is a multi-trillion-dollar deficit in Social Security and over a $40 trillion debt on Medicare and Medicaid.
Unless we address these long-term entitlement issues, there is no way we are going to be able to prevent the majority of Americans' taxes from being devoted to those two programs. So we need to establish those commissions and we need to put them to work and we need to put them to work right away.
Now, I am told there is general agreement. Why not do it now? Why not do it now? We also need better accountability, better transparency, better oversight, and better results. Among many disappointments we have over TARP, one was that we were told the Congress and the American people would have oversight and transparency, and they would know exactly how that initial $350 billion was being spent.
The American people and Members of Congress have been bitterly disappointed as TARP shifted from one priority to another. Funds went to the automotive industry, which none of us had anticipated when we voted for and approved it. We need more transparency and accountability and oversight of how this, probably the biggest single emergency spending package in the history of this country, is being spent.
I notice I have other Members here who wish to speak on this issue. I hope we can pass this alternative, some $421 billion, to what has now surged to over $1 trillion. It probably may not pass for the reasons of numbers, but if we do not sit down and negotiate and come up with a package that is more than a $50- or $60- or $80 billion reduction, when we are talking about $1.2 trillion, the American people will not be well served.
They will not be well served by requiring Davis-Bacon, they will not be well served by requiring ``Buy American,'' they will not be well served by spending their hard-earned dollars on unnecessary programs that even though in the eyes of some may have virtue, have no or very little association with job creation and relief for Americans who are struggling to stay in their homes and either keep their jobs or go out and find a new one.
I believe the United States of America will recover from the economic crisis. I have a fundamental faith, belief, that American workers are the most productive, the most innovative, and the best in the world. But they need some help right now. What they need is the right kind of help.
I urge my colleagues, when you see the money that is being spent in the name of job creation and stimulus that is laying a debt burden on our children and our grandchildren, we need to have serious consideration of this kind of spending because it is not fair, not only to this generation of Americans but to future generations as well.
are for PERMANENT jobs; i.e., those jobs will never go away, but they are for jobs that will not help the average person. We will be paying forever for those jobs.
As I said before, stimulus means jobs, tax cuts, housing fixes, etc. What most of the package contains is stuff that should be in a regular budget. Cut it from 600-something pages down to 4 or 5, or at least 10 at the most, and you have something.
Rural Development Programs, rural housing services, utilities including distance learning, telemedicine,and broadband program
Bonneville Power Administration
Appropriations Transfer Authority: Department of Energy for `Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy', `Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability', and `Advanced Battery Loan Guarantee Program'
Financial Services: GSA, federal building fund,energy efficient government motor vehicle fleet procurement
Then we come to small businesses. Economic Stimulus LENDING for small businesses.
Shall I keep going or does everybody get the jist of this so-called stimulus package?
Stimulus package, etc.
I absolutely agree with you. You are 150% right.
For the original package...(sm)
but unsure if it will help as it stands. The popularity of the against vote for the bill has been fascilitated by some keen advertising on the pub side. I'm hoping Obama will call the pubs out on tonight's address and point out exactly what it is that pubs want in the bill (more tax breaks for the wealthy that we can't afford), and in particular, which pubs want it. If he does that keep your eye on the polls. People will be outraged.
It's done. He just signed the package.
Got a kick out the guy who owns a small business out there. So young and employs 55 people in 3 years. He mispronounced Biden's name and everybody laughed. I don't think he realized what he did. He was nervous.
I never met a soldier who didn't want a package.
Bringing them home does not enter into this. Yet AGAIN you cannot stop your political agenda long enough to think of just the troops. I know now it is impossible. We all want them home. ALL OF US. It's just that some us would like to make their lives as easy as possible while they are away, and SOME OF US WANT TO SAY THANK YOU.
The O also voted for the bailout package. (nm)
x
Boooo... stimulus package
Is anyone else not happy about this stimulus package? Stimulus Package breakdown
I know some of you don't like Glen Beck, but he has broken it down by the numbers and provides links so you can check the facts yourself. It sounds okay until you get to the heading: "When is the money going to be spent, and on what?"
and it will not help the people that need help. It doesn't provide help to the regular "joe's" out there that need help. It is all about the greed again. Most of it will only help regular "joe's" by the year 2011, not now. By that time, we will either be down the tubes or everything will have corrected itself on its own.
I don't think government should meddle in ways to try to turn the economy around. It only mkes it worse. Look at all the handouts in the first stimulus package. Did the regular "joe's" get any help out of it? Nope. It will be the same with this one. Did you see Glen Beck's breakdown on the package posted below? If not, I suggest you look at it or else I can post it here.
It goes to show that the democrats don't give a darn about us, just their agenda even though 11 democrats voted against it. That has to say something. Evidently, the democrats (and I don't mean this harshly) didn't get enough calls from their constiuents to knock this package into oblivion. They were in a hurry to pass it? Why? Not because it would help us, but because they wanted it passed before anyone really got a chance to see what it entailed.
Sorry, but I disagree with you whole heartedly. This will not help. It will only hurt. This will take our dollars down to zero and the next thing you know, we will be taking wheelbarrows of money to the store to buy a loaf of bread if you can even find it in the stores.
In fact, 2 years ago, they turned a whole mountain into windmills. Who has those jobs? The company that put them there. Their guys come from another state to maintain and repair them. No locals are employed by that company. Doesn't make sense but that's the way they do it.
Mythbusting the Obama Recovery Package
Sorry for the c/p, but I could not get the link take from ourfuture.org, but this is one of the most complete rebuttals I have seen in defense of the proposed program.
1. The proposed recovery package is too big.
False. Most progressive economists agree (and Paul Krugman is downright emphatic) that it's going to take a minimum of a trillion dollars of well-placed investment to pull our economy out of this ditch. This is no time for half-measures, blue-ribbon committees, pilot projects, or trial balloons: this is a life-or-death crisis that requires immediate and massive intervention.
CAF Senior Fellow Bernie Horn puts it this way: "The American economy is huge and it’s at a standstill. It’s like a motionless 100-car freight train—or one going backwards slowly. A small locomotive simply can’t pull it forward. We need an engine large enough to work, one that can create millions of jobs. If anything, a $775 billion 2-year plan may be too small rather than too big."
Dean Baker of the Center for Economic and Policy Research echoed this same thing on Rachel Maddow's show last Tuesday night. It's got to be big. And it's got to be now. Anything too small—or too late—and the American economy will be at serious risk of stagnating the same way Japan's did in the 1990s.
2. If we can't afford (insert pet project here), we certainly can't afford this.
Yes, we can. What we really can't afford is a huge recession that undercuts the tax base. That's a vicious cycle that will make it increasingly harder to dig out the longer this goes on. The Congressional Budget Office projects that the current slowdown will cost the federal government $166 billion in lost tax revenues in 2009—a number that could easily get even larger in coming years if we fall into a real depression. If we get on that trendline, we could lose a trillion dollars in government revenues by the end of Obama's first term. We need to invest what we have while we still have it if we hope to have a strong economy going forward.
This argument is based on the limited view that wealth is mainly generated by loaning or borrowing at interest—a common enough assumption among financial people over the past 30 years. A more progressive view is that real wealth is generated by labor, combined with access to resources required for production. Putting people to work creates wealth. So does ensuring that our current failing energy regime is replaced as rapidly as possible with one that's infinitely renewable and that we will finally be in full control of. And so do other kinds of infrastructure investments, which form the footing on which a new round of businesses can rise and thrive.
Businesses have always invested their capital to create more capital. The best parts of Obama's proposal involve getting the government to do the same thing. Conservatives are resisting this because don't believe that there's such a thing as the common wealth—which is how they've rationalized their plundering of our common assets. We need to make it absolutely clear that we do believe in the common wealth—and that their assaults on everything that allows America to generate national wealth are going stop, right here and right now.
3. It's more important to balance the budget. Fix that, and the rest will take care of itself.
Read history much? Herbert Hoover is history's poster boy for the idea that balancing the budget during a recession is the best way known to turn it into a full-on depression. And that wasn't a one-off: FDR repeated the lesson in 1937, when he succumbed to the pleas of budget-hawk conservatives and tried to balance the budget—a move that put the brakes on what had, until then, been a solid recovery.
Looking forward, this year's numbers also show the case clearly. Economists are already estimating that spending by individuals and businesses will be off by $300 to $500 billion in 2009. The upshot of this will be millions of lost jobs, which in turn will mean even lower spending and more job losses next year as the country accelerates toward depression.
The only way to halt this slide is for the government to step in and fill the hole with an additional $300 billion-$500 billion of its own spending—and to spend that money on investments that will create as many jobs as possible. The longer we wait, the more government spending it will ultimately take to pull us out of this—and the less able we'll be to muster that much cash.
Balanced budgets are important, but not as important right now as making sure every American has a paycheck they can count on. We can't afford to sacrifice the fate of the entire country to this one economic ideal.
4. The worst thing we can possibly do is raise taxes. Or borrow the money, God forbid.
More misplaced priorities.
As for taxes: Obama's already told us, without apologies to anyone, that he plans to raise taxes on people making over $250,000 a year—the people who've profited most from our current high levels of inequality. Practically, it makes sense to raise taxes on the affluent, since they're increasingly the only ones left who actually have any money. And morally, it's only fair that those who've gained the most from conservative mismanagement of the economy (regardless of their own political leanings) should be the first to pay the bills for it.
As for borrowing: Don't look now, but the whole planet is reeling from financial problems as least as big as ours. Even in the midst of this colossal fiscal mess we're in, if you're an individual, business, or government with excess capital to store somewhere, the USA is still the safest place on earth to park it.
They're so eager for our American brand of low-risk investment that they're even willing to lend their cash to us at interest rates that are very close to zero (and may actually turn out to be less than zero, once you add in inflation). If someone offered you the chance to borrow massive amounts of money without paying interest, you'd do it, right? Well, that money's already sitting on the table, just waiting for us to put it to work jump-starting our economy again. We'd be fools not to take it.
5. When you want to stimulate the economy, tax cuts always beat government spending hands-down.
Another conservative fantasy that disintegrates on contact with reality.
The chart that shows the effectiveness of various forms of government stimulus, based on recent attempts, is here. (Conservatives will be infuriated to learn that food stamps come out on top, generating $1.73 for every dollar spent. Infrastructure investments come in a respectable third. The bottom half of the chart is wall-to-wall tax cut schemes.)
The problem with tax cuts is that people don't spend them in ways that get the economy moving. The Wall Street Journal reports that only 10 to 20 percent of the money remanded to taxpayers in the 2008 tax rebate actually got spent. The other 80 to 90 percent ended up in people's personal savings, were used to pay off creditors, or were simply absorbed by inflation and higher living costs.
Knowing this, we're a bit dismayed Obama is proposing to sink as much as 40 percent of his stimulus package into tax cuts. That's too much, if you ask us. But at least they're targeted at the middle class—people who are more likely to spend that money here in the U.S., rather than ship it off to investments abroad.
6. Large-scale government investment would inevitably turn into an orgy of waste, fraud and abuse.
True—but only if we let conservatives run the show.
The fact is that all human endeavors—from running a household to running a nation—entail a fair amount of waste, fraud and abuse. Bad decisions get made. Greed gets the better of people. Not everybody is as honest as we'd wish them to be.
But in spite of that truth, nobody in history can top the Americans when it comes to planning and executing successful large-scale investment projects. (A thousand years from now, that's what they'll be saying about us: Not always smart about foreign policy, but man, could those people think big—and they usually pulled it off, too.) In our happier past, good management, careful oversight, and clear accountability have always gone a long way toward preventing really big problems, and ensured that we got the most for our collective buck.
Unfortunately, if we've learned anything about conservatives at this late date, it's that they'll defang or dismantle these mechanisms every chance they get. They think rules are for lesser mortals, oversight is a form of Big Brother-style oppression, and accountability is for people who can't afford lobbyists and lawyers. I don't think anyone would even try argue any more that when it comes to waste, fraud, and abuse, conservatives are the hands-down experts.
What's ironic is that they're now offering edifying moral guidance to the rest of us on the subject. All you can do is point and giggle at the stupefying hypocrisy of it all.
7. We need stimulus now—and tax cuts are the only way to get the money out there fast enough.
Not really, no. Much of the infrastructure spending in the recovery package will be targeted at projects that are “shovel ready”—the ones that are planned, approved, and sitting on the shelf ready to go as soon as there's money to fund them. Some of these could start generating jobs as early as April or May.
Some of this money will also be aimed at covering state budget deficits. That money will also be spent immediately on things like health care, child-care programs and other underfunded state services that employ large numbers of people.
That's a lot of direct funding that will put people to work quickly—quite likely, faster than giving people tax cuts and letting them trickle out through the economy.
8. It’s wrong to bail out spend-thrift states. Let them stimulate their own damned economies.
Please. Haven't we all had a lifetime bellyfull of tax revolutionaries and drown-the-government-in-the-bathtub crazies? I swear...can't live with 'em, can't just shoot 'em....
States aren't in trouble because they overspent their allowances. Almost every state constitution in the country requires that the government balance its budget every single year. You want fiscal sanity? Anybody who's put in their time in state government knows all about it. They've made the hard choices, and faced the consequences, too.
The problem is that the recession has undercut state tax revenues to the point where these governments can no longer afford to cover their obligations—some of which (like bonds) were taken on years ago, when times were better. Commitments that were fiscally prudent by any measure back then are wiping them out now. Budgets that were balanced and sound when they were first outlined a couple years ago are impossible monsters today.
And, unlike the federal government, the states can't deficit spend their way out of it. That's why they need federal help.
9. This whole Keynesian thing has been totally disproved. It didn’t work during the Depression. It didn’t work for Japan in the 1980s.
Say what? We know that rewriting history is a favorite conservative pastime. America is Christian country. Slavery was good for black people. Bush was never a real conservative. Saddam was in cahoots with al-Qaida. And on it goes.
The campaign to discredit Keynes (which is directly traceable to the Heritage Foundation) is a new and rather audacious fiction—one that leaves both progressive and conservative economists as gobsmacked and sputtering as scientists get when you bring up "intelligent design." And the factual basis for it is, if anything, even more specious.
Paul Krugman addresses both the Depression and the example of Japan in his new book, "The Return of Depression Economics." According to his telling of the tale, in both cases the affected economies strengthened as long as the government continued to infuse capital into them; but bobbled when there was enough improvement that the budget hawks could get some political traction. When the spending flagged, so did the recovery. In Japan, bold steps alternating with repeated failures of nerve created a liquidity trap that stagnated the country's economy through most of the 1990s.
Keynes' prescription has worked everywhere it's been tried—as long as governments acted boldly and quickly enough. It's not medicine that works if you take it in half-doses, or quit before the course of treatment is finished. In fact, doing it with less than full commitment can actually make the situation worse.
10. This is a partisan program that's designed to promote the Democratic agenda.
No. Almost every businessperson in America—including the conservative ones—are stepping forward in support of the stimulus package. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is on board with it. So (unsurprisingly) are most of the building trades and engineering groups who stand to prosper with a new round of infrastructure spending. The current economy is hurting everyone, regardless of political affiliation—and most Americans agree that it's time for the government to step in and get things going again.
TAKE ACTION
Write your member of Congress to ask for passage of a bold economic recovery plan now.
And Yes. I've written before about the way this kind of investment in the health and well-being of the middle class can, in the end, transform long-held conservative beliefs about how the economy should work. A stimulus package that works will prove that government can do important things that no other entity can do; that it can act effectively in the public interest; and that there's actually such a thing as a national common good that deserves to be protected. In short, it will reaffirm progressive values in a way that's irrefutable, and will earn the enduring respect of the country.
Most of the money will not go to the people. So far, I have not come across anything that deals with foreclosures, etc. The item I posted last night from our local newspaper is the so-called stimulus package that will help foreclosures.
Read the doggone bill that they are trying to pass, please. Then you may see the light of day.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Amid record oil prices and soaring gasoline costs, Exxon Mobil's $400 million retirement package to its former CEO is a shameful display of greed that should be reviewed by Congress and investigated by federal regulators, Democratic Sen. Byron Dorgan (news, bio, voting record) said on Tuesday.
Dorgan said he wants Exxon Mobil officials to appear at a Senate Commerce Committee hearing to explain how the corporation justifies giving its former boss, Lee Raymond, such a huge retirement package.
There can be no more compelling evidence that the price gouging and market manipulation which has produced record oil prices is out of control, and is working to serve the forces of individual greed and corporate gluttony at the painful expense of millions of American consumers, Dorgan said.
Dorgan's criticism of Raymond's financial package came on the same day that U.S. crude oil prices hit a record high of more than $71 a barrel at the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Higher crude oil prices are helping to push of up gasoline costs. The Energy Department reported prices jumped 10 cents over the last week to a national average of $2.78 a gallon, up 55 cents from a year ago.
President George W. Bush said on Tuesday he was concerned about the impact high gasoline prices were having on families and businesses.
Exxon earned the wrath of many lawmakers when it reported more than $36 billion in profits last year as energy prices paid by consumers soared.
Dorgan said he will push to win passage of his legislation that would impose a windfall profits tax on big oil companies and rebate that money to consumers, unless the companies used their earnings to explore for and produce more energy.
I think a sensible public policy would insist that the big oil companies either invest those windfall profits in things that will increase our own domestic energy supplies, or we should return some of that money to consumers, Dorgan said.
Using them to drop $400 million dollars in the pocket of a big oil executive is simply unacceptable, he added.
Exxon Mobil has defended Raymond's retirement package, saying it was pegged to the rise in the company's profit and market capitalization that occurred during his tenure.
By Andrea Tantaros
Republican Political Commentator/FOXNews.com Contributor
President-elect Barack Obama is prepping to jam another massive stimulus plan down our throats. Lately the president-elect has been hitting the media circuit to sell this monstrosity and each time he launches into his pitch he proves that what he lacks in actual specifics he makes up for in vocabulary. But is this bloated bill just a ruse for another big, federally funded bailout for struggling states?
Obama
According to Obama, his road and sewer stimulus package would pump billions into things like “infrastructure” and “green jobs.” Wait a minute, nobody is saying that the failure to spend over $700 billion on roads and sewers created this mess, and no one saying that new sewers will get us out of it. Obama has insisted that we must invest in what works. How do we know green jobs will work and provide a return? We don’t. And it’s quite a pricey experiment to find out.
What’s most troubling is the notion that more taxpayer money is heading right for states that are in the red. Just a few weeks ago, governors and mayors made their way to Washington, DC to hound Obama for a handout. Now mayors across America have submitted over 11,000 proposals for some bailout cash including one to fund a mob museum in Vegas. Talk about a real gamble in Sin City. Is Tony “The Ant” Spilotro really our best bet?
Take New York for example, a state that’s in financial ruin. The Empire State is facing a $15 billion budget deficit. Why would we encourage a state that spent itself into disaster to spend more? There are workers already repairing sewers and roads around the Big Apple and America. Will Obama give money that will be spent on existing jobs or hire thousands of new sewer workers?
According to Obama, “only government can break the vicious cycles that are crippling our economy…where an inability to lend and borrow stops growth and leads to even less credit.” What our future president doesn’t understand is that the vicious cycles were caused by the government through the creation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the refusal to regulate, in part because there was a belief that a regulation would prevent the prosperity associated with owning a home. How do we expect government to be part of the solution? According to CNBC we have allocated 7 trillion to fix our economic crisis and there is $300 billion currently left in TARP. Is that not enough?
Obama is refusing to ask the same question that homeowners didn’t answer when the mortgage mess was going on: Can we afford to borrow this money? At some point we are mortgaging our national security by letting developing countries buy our debt. The more we spend the less we have to spend on our national defense. What if China develops a distaste for buying our debt? Maybe refusing to borrow more money might be the best thing for us. Sort of like the way parents cut off a frivolous child’s allowance.
On the campaign trail Obama campaigned for balanced budgets. This might be his first broken promise. While we wait to hear answers about what this massive deficit spending will do to our currency, to inflation and to our national security even Obama admits that his recovery plan alone will not solve all the problems that led us into this crisis. (So why are we doing it??) I’ll tell you what, for a trillion dollars, it better.
http://foxforum.blogs.foxnews.com/2009/01/13/tantaros_stimulus/
You are completely skipping the part about the stimulus package
It is on his own blog! How is that fair in the least little bit? So because my husband is a white construction worker who has worked hard ALL his life, payed his way through college without taking out loans or borrowing money (it took him six years to graduate because he was working and taking classes) took out a mortgage that he could handle, yet now due to the housing crisis and economic crisis is getting the short end of the stick, just because he is white he shouldn't be included in this package?
And someone attacked me earlier for being racist and saying that maybe he just wasn't the "best candidate" for a position. I think I can 100% say it didn't matter if he was the "best candidate," it mattered that he wasn't a minority.
This is so out of line. There is no such thing as EQUALITY. Never will be.
The real story is that this is supposed to be a stimulus package.
I can see from your post how this would help save states money over time, but how would it help stimulate the economy now? It wouldn't and that's why people are so upset.
The real story is that this is supposed to be a stimulus package.
I can see from your post how this would help save states money over time, but how would it help stimulate the economy now? It wouldn't and that's why people are so upset. Even Obama has said that if it doesn't create a job or save a job, it doesn't belong in there.
Obama hopes the stimulus package is large How is paying for somebody's birth control gonna produce jobs or a 20 MILLION dollar minor league baseball museum, 20 million dollars at a zoo, OR 1.5 million to reduce prostitution in Ohio? This is nothing but a pork barrel project.........isn't that what Obama said he WOULD DO AWAY WITH? All pork barrel spending? What a joke!
Kinda makes me rethink the whole stimulus package........
Evidently Pickens Plan was incorporated in there..........as much as it was allowed!
I just recieved a package back in the mail OPENED AND EMPTY...
with a letter from the postoffice asking what it was I mailed off so they can search for it. Never had this happen before.
With the stimulus package there are built in tax credits for small businesses and SBA...sm
I have worked in retail as an assistant buyer and see their profit margins...and I know there are many legit, honest, mom and pop stores, but they usually make up for it by hiring school kids for slave wages and also family members. I am talking about across the board, in factories, retail, hospitalitiy, techno, every sector, these workers would all be paying more EACH WEEK into the the tax stucture in this country, strengtheing our reserves, becomeing consumers themselves because they can finally afford something....I feel like I dropped from another planet here, or industry in MT is not the norm by far.
I just thought it might be nice to hear an original thought. sm
I guess I was reaching.
No one is asking for anyone to get a pass...sm
There is enough blame to go around, both dems and repubs, greed and dishonesty knows no party. The guilty should be held accountable, but that is not the immediate concern. Turning this around is so we all don't go down the tubes.
I believe it will come to pass....sm
The name for the NAU currency has already been chosen....the Amero.
In addition to the EU and the NAU, there is also the Africa Union which was formed in 2002 and the soon-to-be Asian Union. These unions will eventually form into a one-world government with NATO as its governing body. There will be a single currency as well.
I agree....sometimes I wish I were still blissfully ignorant of all the goings on in the world today, but then I would not be aware of what to watch for and how it would affect me and my family.
Or if none of that comes to pass,
hopefully you will come to realize that the repub fearmongers have been playing on you fears and you bought into it wholeheartedly.
This, too, will come to pass............ sm
but it won't be the religion that you are probably thinking it will be. Better be careful what you wish for.
And why would we thank him when it took 217 votes for this to pass?
nm
I will pass your senitments on to those...
I know who are serving. It will come as no surprise to them. At least you admit that you could care less if it hurts them or not...or worsens their plight or makes their jobs harder...which it does. I will tell them you are of the opinion they just need to pray the protesting works in their favor (and if you think a premature withdrawal, or cut and run, is in their favor that just proves you do not know the majority of the military and how they think), and they just need to suck it up and continue to fight and die to protect your right to tell them to suck it up and just keep on serving, if the war is something they believe strongly in. For you to say that the war is something they believe strongly in also proves that you know nothing about them. They are there because their country sent them there and they believe in the mission. George Bush alone did not send them, no matter how much global amnesia the Democrats want to try to have now. They believe in honor and duty. They believe in something bigger than themselves...they believe there are still things worth dying for...like your right to blythely from your warm safe home to tell them to suck it up, pray the protesting works for them and not against them, because it is more important for you to protest than it is for them to be safer. The least you could have done was a little thank you to go with the suck it up, though.
I know what they will say...they will say *you're welcome...anyway.*
Just a final thought...just WHO do you think cheers when they hear Americans in the street protesting? The ENEMY. Do you remember the scenes of Arabs taking to the streets in celebration when 9-11 happened? They watch us. Protesting in a public way is fodder for them to recruit. Read an article today saying they are using You Tube videos for recruitment. I bet several of the leading Democratic Pres contenders are stars. But if giving Al Qaeda little moral boosts is what floats the protestors' boats, by all means...grab the sign and head for the corner. and I too had to pass on this info
http://share.triangle.com/node/13576
The questions remain :
What is Barack Husein Obama - a Senator from Illinois - doing when he is interacting with a violent rebel, muslim leader in Kenya who may have been responsible for the murder of dozens of innocent people burned to death simply because they took refuge in a church?
What is Barack Husein Obama doing when he interferes in the internal operations of a foreign nation like Kenya?
Are you going to let a well organized and well financed representative of a foreign government push his way any further into your national government?
How many more people have to die before Americans come to understand that Barack Husein Obama is not a product of the land of Lincoln?
Born in Hawaii he spent most of his life in the violent and backward nation of Indonesia – where not too long ago the Australians had to stop the Muslims from killing all the Christians in East Timor.
When will this blood soaked travesty of our national political system come to an end? When will the mocking smirk of our enemies be wiped from our television screens?
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