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Black,
The first spending package Bush had was for the Federal Budget.
This isn't a budget, it is a "stimulus" that acts an awful like a budget."
Two different things.
Bush spent like a drunken sailor. Obama is spending like Paris Hilton, except he doesn't have any money in the bank.
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GrumpyGuy,
"That’ll put city folks back to work" doesn't say anything. You list a thing that does x, and then complain that it doesn't do not-x. Please explain to me how this is supposed to clarify why x is not appropriate.
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Bill in NC wrote:
Tax cuts work faster, which is why payroll tax cuts have been recommended.
It's been demonstrated time and time again that tax cuts don't work to stimulate the U.S. economy.
Think about it this way: Bush and Co. cut taxes and we ended up in a recession that seems to be on the verge of becoming a depression.
'Problem is that deficit-spending doesn't work either. 'Lots of factors come into play, including the huge interest on the loans the country has to take out and the fact that people realize that taxes will eventually have to be hiked to pay for it so they are likely to continue cutbacks even with more cash in the system.
What Congress and the President ought to be focusing on is what they can do under the various trade agreements we're signatories on -- including withdrawing from those agreements where necessary -- in order to boost domestic industry and consumer confidence.
...But they're not going to do that because we owe too much money to our trade-partners.
'Interesting pseudo-Catch-22. All that it takes to break the cycle is having people with courage and integrity in public office. Without that, we're going down hard.
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Doc wrote:
It's been demonstrated time and time again that tax cuts don't work to stimulate the U.S. economy.
Uh, no. Tax cuts do grow the economy. This is taught in every entry level macro course, even by liberal professors.
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freeradical wrote:
Uh, no. Tax cuts do grow the economy. This is taught in every entry level macro course, even by liberal professors.
You should take one of those classes.
Then maybe one of those liberal professors will take the time to explain to you how decreased revenue is made up and what the consequences are when the government spends money without offsetting it via spending reductions or higher taxes.
http://www.cbpp.org/9-27-06tax.htm
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GOP Against Stimulus Part of Stimulus Bill
So the Republicans are all for a good Economic Stimulus bill, meaning one that would stop taxing the rich and stop any corporate taxes and also, somehow, further ruin the environment and whatever. As a result of this clear “small government” philosophy the big-spending corporate-welfare closeted homosexuals adopted last week, GOP congressional leaders have found the parts they just can’t tolerate in the Economic Stimulus legislation: the parts that would create jobs and build American infrastructure. Yes we can’t!
Look, whatever anybody’s uninformed opinions about this Rescue the Economy package, you should at least be able to reconcile “support for economic stimulus legislation” with “support for legislation that will throw a bunch of money at the economy, in the form of money paid for goods and services, manufacturing and labor, and other traditional uncontroversial gears of Capitalism.”
So, here are some specific things the GOP will not condone, in this bill they’re not going to vote for, anyway:
* A billion dollars extra for the 2010 U.S. Census, which is going to pay good money to many jobless people in every American town — and shore up Lockheed-Martin, which is getting $500 million to build the data systems and run the machinery.
* $75 million for FBI employee salaries, because why would you want to pay America’s top cops to do law enforcement and investigations, in America?
* $500 million for Mississippi River flood control projects, which would employ thousands of laborers and keep dozens of construction companies in business, because nothing makes Republicans happier than seeing a Katrina repeat on the teevee every other hurricane season.
* $200 million for green vehicles on U.S. military bases and $600 million to replace the federal fleet of cars with hybrids, because only a gay communist could see the economic benefits of $800 million in sales for U.S. auto manufacturers while simultaneously cutting the government’s gasoline bill by billions per year.
* $1.4 billion for rural garbage-disposal and recycling programs, because who but an Islamo-Fascist would want to provide much-needed jobs for the Red State
* $125 million to rebuild the broken, rotten, third-world sewer system of our Nation’s Capital. You give the blacks this, and who knows what they’ll want next! And by “give,” we mean “pay a decent wage to laborers in D.C., to rebuild their sewers.”
* $6 billion to pay dozens of big regional contractors, hundreds of local businesses and tens of thousands of American workers to retrofit federal buildings so that they’ll be energy efficient.
* $200 million for computer centers at community colleges, because if poor unskilled workers want to “learn the computer,” they should just go to Stanford instead of complaining.
http://wonkette.com/405954/gop-against-s...mulus-bill
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$tevie wrote:
GOP Against Stimulus Part of Stimulus Bill
So the Republicans are all for a good Economic Stimulus bill, meaning one that would stop taxing the rich and stop any corporate taxes and also, somehow, further ruin the environment and whatever. As a result of this clear “small government” philosophy the big-spending corporate-welfare closeted homosexuals adopted last week, GOP congressional leaders have found the parts they just can’t tolerate in the Economic Stimulus legislation: the parts that would create jobs and build American infrastructure. Yes we can’t!
Look, whatever anybody’s uninformed opinions about this Rescue the Economy package, you should at least be able to reconcile “support for economic stimulus legislation” with “support for legislation that will throw a bunch of money at the economy, in the form of money paid for goods and services, manufacturing and labor, and other traditional uncontroversial gears of Capitalism.”
So, here are some specific things the GOP will not condone, in this bill they’re not going to vote for, anyway:
* A billion dollars extra for the 2010 U.S. Census, which is going to pay good money to many jobless people in every American town — and shore up Lockheed-Martin, which is getting $500 million to build the data systems and run the machinery.
* $75 million for FBI employee salaries, because why would you want to pay America’s top cops to do law enforcement and investigations, in America?
* $500 million for Mississippi River flood control projects, which would employ thousands of laborers and keep dozens of construction companies in business, because nothing makes Republicans happier than seeing a Katrina repeat on the teevee every other hurricane season.
* $200 million for green vehicles on U.S. military bases and $600 million to replace the federal fleet of cars with hybrids, because only a gay communist could see the economic benefits of $800 million in sales for U.S. auto manufacturers while simultaneously cutting the government’s gasoline bill by billions per year.
* $1.4 billion for rural garbage-disposal and recycling programs, because who but an Islamo-Fascist would want to provide much-needed jobs for the Red State
* $125 million to rebuild the broken, rotten, third-world sewer system of our Nation’s Capital. You give the blacks this, and who knows what they’ll want next! And by “give,” we mean “pay a decent wage to laborers in D.C., to rebuild their sewers.”
* $6 billion to pay dozens of big regional contractors, hundreds of local businesses and tens of thousands of American workers to retrofit federal buildings so that they’ll be energy efficient.
* $200 million for computer centers at community colleges, because if poor unskilled workers want to “learn the computer,” they should just go to Stanford instead of complaining.
http://wonkette.com/405954/gop-against-s...mulus-bill
This is really supplemental appropriations. different than any other budget. What you are trying to say here is that any spending is stimulus. That is fine but just come out and say it. But none other than Larry Summers has said that stimulus is a targeted, timely expenditure. Of course, I hate to have the government pulling the trigger. Most likely, their aim and timing will be both way off.
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Their aim may be off but that is the only weapon they have. As private capital contracts, jobs evaporate which in turn causes further contraction of private capital which costs jobs which ... ad infinitum until something, maybe everything, collapses.
This infusion MAY and that's a big MAY offset enough of the private contraction to at least stabilize things, it may not, but left to it'd own devises, the private economy will tank and tank fast.
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RgrF wrote:
Their aim may be off but that is the only weapon they have. As private capital contracts, jobs evaporate which in turn causes further contraction of private capital which costs jobs which ... ad infinitum until something, maybe everything, collapses.
This infusion MAY and that's a big MAY offset enough of the private contraction to at least stabilize things, it may not, but left to it'd own devises, the private economy will tank and tank fast.
That's a big bet on the table.
A year's federal tax revenue out there and another year's tax revenue on the table on the slight chance that it will slow down the slide.
Meanwhile, there's reason to believe that we'd be coming out of the recession in another year or so with or without the government stimulus.
Example:
http://fosters.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article.../712049817
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Greg wrote:
GrumpyGuy,
I don't see why those things you've listed are unimportant or irrelevant. They money has to be injected somewhere...if the package didn't look like that, what should it look like?
Honest-to-gosh, those all look fairly reasonable, if not noble, to me.
I have the same questions. How about just cutting a check for every man, woman & child in the US? Otherwise, this is how the government spends money, non?
Greg wrote:
"$420 million for Indian health facilities. Good day to be a Native American."
It is?
I guess as long as you survived "Manifest Destiny" it is.
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