I was just gonna drop any more arguments, but it kept dogging me and following up on this may get the thread back on topic. First off, might you supply a cite to the CBO estimate? I’d like to look it over; what I’m finding is dated, mostly blog posts and news summaries, and the situation is so fluid that it would be good to be looking at the same thing.
Second, the relative importance of the amount spent this year is certainly debatable. For instance, if it’s estimated that $974B will be spent by June 2010, then it’s not important at all. But I don’t know, not having any figures. (I believe I’ve seen cites in other threads that estimated 64% spent by mid-2010.)
Third, you got a list in the OP of what the GOP is claiming as wasteful. Cite some specifics, if you please, rather than uselessly dismissing the entirety with a totally content- and thought-free claim of “pork”. Personally, I think the DTV coupons don’t belong. Based solely on what I’ve heard in the past, I think throwing money to Amtrak is a bad idea. I’m not sure I see the benefit of leasing alternative energy vehicles on military bases. But I see a lot that I could support also.
First, it doesn’t matter if what’s in the package supports an agenda – actually, it damn well should! If it didn’t, it would be less effective overall. What actually matters is if any particular item will have a stimulative effect…that’s the yardstick one needs to apply.
And as to the crap argument you forward about inevitable recovery, let’s go absurdly rhetorical one more time: in the long term, we’ll all be dead. So what happens in the short term doesn’t matter, right?
Most of these things look like pork or like something that wouldn’t be economically stimulative on the surface, but look deeper and most of them actually make good sense economically. The Hollywood film thing is a favorite of the tomato-throwing crowd in Congress and elsewhere, but Hollywood movies are one of America’s few high-grossing exports.
On the other hand, when the I-35W bridge in Minnesota collapsed in August of 2007, there was no “shovel ready” plan to replace it. Yet on September 18, 2008, a brand spanking new bridge opened, barely a year later. How was that possible, if infrastructure planning and construction is so ponderously slow?
The whole “shovel ready” argument is a sham. We can build bridges, highways and many other civil projects at the drop of a hat. All we lack is the political will.
That’s a shining example and I hope we can emulate it. But you conclude from the success of one project that the argument that infrastructure is slow is a sham? I’m afraid I’ll need more evidence than a single anecdote to counter the testimony of many in the infrastructure business, the dozens of boondoggles as counter-examples, and the personal knowledge of how long environmental permitting can take. I don’t necessarily disagree that with sufficient political will these projects can be expedited. That seems pretty much tautological so long as political will means the will to oversee the project to ensure it is done properly, to bypass the normal procedures, and to throw tons of resources at the project.
But the sustained political will that came from the Minnesota bridge collapse is not the same political will that will be attached to every project in this spending package.
If that is the case, couldn’t the dems just say, “OK. we will take all of that stuff out”. If it is less than small potatoes then it shouldn’t make a difference and they can pass the package.
Give em an inch and they’ll take a mile. Ben Nelson and friends are currently offering $100+ billion in cuts in order to buy the votes of 3 or 4 Republicans. That’s enough to hurt the package, and the country.
If the Pubs have gotta cut, let them cut some of the tax cuts from the measure. That’ll make rescuing the economy cheaper and more efficient. That’s what the GOP wants, right?
Well, the details of the stimulus package are not fully known by even those who voted on it. And the number of pet projects that have come to light thus far is not encouraging. So much for transparency.
I guess for some people ,if you really want to stimulate the economy, just end all taxes. Things will be fine then.
Except tax cuts have been tried for the last 8 years. What do we have to show for that?
Sorry, but tax cuts simply aren’t enough to recreate the Bush Miracle. You need tax cuts in coordination with a futile and ruinously expensive military adventure, paid for on the credit card. For extra ooomph, it would help if you applaud a housing bubble as a splendid social experiment in “ownership”. Look for his new book “The Leadership Secrets of the Alpha Lemming”. From Remainder House.
Sorry, but how would this stimulate the economy in a significant, long-term way? The stimulus bill is about more than simply putting cash in our pockets to spend. It’s also about giving people security in their long-term employment, health, and education. Have we become so focused on living life paycheck to paycheck that we can’t see something that simple?
Giving all of our unemployed people in the US a $6500 giftcard would be a blessing, no doubt. But would it give any of them a job? Would it assure them that the country is headed along a new direction that will not see the same kind of corporate waste and greed they’ve become accustomed to?
If, as they say constantly on the news and talking-heads programs, this is a crisis of consumer confidence, then we need to give consumers actual confidence. A $6500 safety net is, at best, a juvenile solution to a problem that’s been maturing for over a decade.
You know what would give me confidence? Seeing the people who raped our financial institutions stood up against a wall and shot. The immediate passage of laws that make fraud and stock manipulation capital crimes, that would renew my confidence. Madoff’s fat ass swinging from a lamp-post, that would get me spending again. Anything less than a total repudiation of “Business As Usual” will keep my wallet closed. It’s time for another revolution.
In a free market it is entrepreneurs who are going to create jobs, not the government. Sure, the government can create jobs, but government can’t create wealth. Government takes wealth from people who create it and then put it to use in a way that government deems fit. But ultimately it is entrepreneurship that creates wealth, and innovation. We’d need a much more drastic overhaul of not only our economic system but our political system to see a change in this. Generally speaking I don’t think a planned economy is workable but it’s definitely not workable with democracy.
By the same measure, it’s the job of individuals to acquire homes for themselves. Awhile back government decided it was their responsibility to get people into home ownership and out of renting, and look what has happened. The last thing I want is to see government assume primary responsibility for job creation.
