1/29/2009 3:13:08 PM

- palin
- Jtp
- Bush

yep

Really the only respectable republicans I can think of are John McCain and GrumpyGOP.

1/29/2009 3:13:49 PM

and you wonder why so many people think of democrats as elitist assholes...

1/29/2009 3:24:40 PM

OH NOES SOCIALIST, COMMUNIST, ATHEIST, ELITIST, ANTI TROOPS, ANTI AMERICAN, ANTI LEE GREENWOOD, AND AND AND ...BIG CITY LIBERUHLS!



[Edited on January 29, 2009 at 4:20 PM. Reason : -]

1/29/2009 4:11:12 PM

dont forget "anti american"



[Edited on January 29, 2009 at 4:18 PM. Reason : .]

1/29/2009 4:18:11 PM

Quote :

"and you wonder why so many people think of democrats as elitist assholes..."

I'd rather be stereotyped as an elitist asshole than a stupid asshole.

[Edited on January 29, 2009 at 4:21 PM. Reason : ]

1/29/2009 4:21:27 PM

Quote :

"I'd rather be stereotyped as an elitist asshole than a stupid asshole."

The idiots who voted for this should be classified as stupid and elitist assholes.

1/29/2009 4:30:04 PM

stupid...or dishonest

1/29/2009 4:38:00 PM

^^ that may be the case X years from now when the results of this pan out.

But it could go the other way too.

I don't blame our politicians for panicking when you have thousands and thousands of people being laid off, 10% of homes at foreclosure (or at risk for forclosure, i cant remember), banks that are struggling to stay open, the second largest electronics retailer in the company going bankrupt, and the largest carmaker on the verge of bankruptcy. Then there's the psychological impact of the recent rash of murder-suicides tangentially related to these issues.

I wouldn't want the be the dickhole who says "let's wait and see" when that could easily have catastrophic consequences. I'd rather be the dickhole that says "maybe we could try this" then at least I can say I tried something.

It's a shitty situation all around though, and I don't really hold it against them (the lawmakers) too much.

It's clear the bailout is going to go through at this point though.

[Edited on January 29, 2009 at 4:39 PM. Reason : ]

1/29/2009 4:39:21 PM

Quote :

"The magnitude of the spending bill, and its urgency, drew a swarm of lobbyists seeking money and tax breaks. The concrete and asphalt industries battled over how the government should spend billions proposed for road and bridge repairs, while dairy and beef cattle producers butted heads over talk that the government might buy up dairy cattle for slaughter to drive up depressed milk prices. Unions backed infrastructure spending. States sought budget bailouts."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123307183916519783.html

1/29/2009 4:39:39 PM

Quote :

" You understanding of society is about as shallow as my bird bath if you do not understand the economic value of planned parenthood. While not a short term bet it is a long term investment. Less single welfare moms, allowing couples to plan and put themselves in good financial situation before having children, and a new decrease in crime are all good benefits in my mind. "

I'm not arguing against federal funding for Planned Parenthood (TM) or reproductive planning in general I'm only arguing that it provides no short term economic stimulus and thus never belonged in this bill.

1/29/2009 5:00:44 PM

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=anzJooSeABDM&refer=home

Congress bitching about banks giving 18 billion in bonuses to execs.

It's lol-able that congress is bitching about 18 billion when they just toss around 800 billion almost like it's nothing. Hypocrites.

1/29/2009 6:33:48 PM

i agree with santa, they are simply using the current economic climate to pass a spending bill full of democratic pet projects and labeling it as a jobs "stimulus" bill. There is so much in this jobs bill not remotely related to creating jobs in the short or long term its laughable to even call this a stimulus bill at all.

If you want to pass this crap, and im sure most dems on here do, then do it in the open not disguised as a bill that will help out with jobs in the shortterm. Even the CBO says it will take around 18 months anyway. Doesnt seem very transparent to me.

1/29/2009 6:34:26 PM

exactly. you can polish a turd and call it what you want to, but it's still shit.

1/29/2009 6:37:39 PM

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123310466514522309.html

WSJ called it what it is today, if the MSM picks up on it we might have a chance to slim this thing down a lot.

"Never let a serious crisis go to waste. What I mean by that is it's an opportunity to do things you couldn't do before."

So said White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel in November, and Democrats in Congress are certainly taking his advice to heart. The 647-page, $825 billion House legislation is being sold as an economic "stimulus," but now that Democrats have finally released the details we understand Rahm's point much better. This is a political wonder that manages to spend money on just about every pent-up Democratic proposal of the last 40 years.

1/29/2009 6:40:41 PM

I think the president should get line-item veto power.

1/29/2009 6:43:44 PM

well he can basically veto it until he gets the bill he wants. The scary thing is, i think this IS the bill he wants.

[Edited on January 29, 2009 at 6:46 PM. Reason : ..]

1/29/2009 6:46:12 PM

^^^ This is the only disconcerting part of that article to me:

Quote :

"As for the promise of accountability, some $54 billion will go to federal programs that the Office of Management and Budget or the Government Accountability Office have already criticized as "ineffective" or unable to pass basic financial audits. These include the Economic Development Administration, the Small Business Administration, the 10 federal job training programs, and many more."

From things i've read elsewhere, the WSJ column is barking up the wrong tree. There are more egregious portions of the spending bill, but they amount to such a small percentage of the final total, it looks kind of ridiculous to complain about them.

1/29/2009 6:49:38 PM

this is fucking scary.

on the other hand, i want my check

1/29/2009 7:58:04 PM

So let me get this straight, Kainen's defense of this bill is that Republicans are dumb? So because the Republicans have made poor decisions then that makes this bill a good idea? This "stimulus bill" will do nothing close to stimulating the economy, all it will do is add to the massive amount of debt that has already piled up. Soon no one will buy our debt and that will cause the Fed to do it which will be the exact same thing that Zimbabwe does. Boy it sure works for them!

1/29/2009 8:23:41 PM

I imagine a lot of Obama supporters are beginning to understand who they elected, but it's too late. The problem is, the republicans would be trying something similar, though hopefully it wouldn't be as bad. My ultra-liberal friends aren't even defending this bill.

1/29/2009 8:53:00 PM

Quote :

"I imagine a lot of Obama supporters are beginning to understand who they elected, but it's too late."

Huh?

Obama so far has been exactly what I expected, and has slightly exceeded what I expected.

1/29/2009 8:56:21 PM

Quote :

"I imagine a lot of Obama supporters are beginning to understand who they elected, but it's too late"

because surely we'd be better off having McPalin running the show

1/29/2009 9:13:51 PM

watch mccain be the only republican senator to vote for the stimulus bill.

1/29/2009 9:32:55 PM

I think the point a lot of people are missing is that just because McCain would have been stupid enough to do something like this too does not excuse the fact that this is an absolutely terrible idea

1/29/2009 9:51:00 PM

Quote :

"I think the point a lot of people are missing is that just because McCain would have been stupid enough to do something like this too does not excuse the fact that this is an absolutely terrible idea"

agreed. i have no problem bashing obama over this as long as republican stop trying to act like their shit doesn't stink and their leaders would NEVER do anything wrong either.

1/29/2009 10:45:03 PM

I doubt Bob Barr would have supported this type of bill.

1/29/2009 10:47:36 PM

^^^ Obama's support of a bailout was no surprise, for one.

And I also don't know a single person IRL who is gung-ho about this plan. But the alternative of "do nothing" doesn't seem like a good idea either, and this in essence is what a lot on the right seem to want to happen.

1/29/2009 10:49:06 PM

its not THIS BILL or do nothing, thats what obama and the liberals would like you to think, there are other options such as a heavily modified version of this "stimulus"

1/29/2009 11:01:24 PM

I understand that "doing nothing" seems like a bad idea. We should atleast try something so that we can atleast say we tried to fix it.

But "doing nothing" is trying something. Something that hasn't been done in some time. Our government has been tampering with the economy for a long time, in some cases it may have been for the greater good but lately they seem to just inflate the money supply and create artificial bubbles that burst with the cycles of our economy. Those peaks and bubbles may have contributed to our wealth as a nation in past years but now that they have burst it seems we may be worse off.

I want to see what becomes of our economy without huge government deficit spending. I think we would come out of this recession more resilient and well rounded if we just "do nothing".

1/29/2009 11:01:41 PM

^ what do you mean by "doing nothing?"

Because a particular set of "doing nothing" is what caused this crisis in the first place. Therefore, it's not possible to do nothing.

^^ Heavily modified in what way? where do you draw the line between "stimulus" and "excessive government spending"?

1/29/2009 11:06:28 PM

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/washingtondc/la-na-gop30-2009jan30,0,4107081.story

Quote :

"Donald Manzullo, a House Republican from Illinois, has proposed a $5,000 voucher for anyone buying a new car. Kentucky's Mitch McConnell, the Senate GOP leader, favors a temporary suspension of the payroll tax. Jim DeMint, a Republican senator from South Carolina, wants to permanently cut the federal income tax. As Republicans fight President Obama's gargantuan economic plan, they have plenty of ideas. What they don't have is a party-wide consensus: They can't agree among themselves on the best alternative, or on whether government action is even needed to pull the economy from its nose dive."

Wow, the loss of their leader has really hurt them. The repubs were almost solely characterized the past 8 years by their solidarity and group-think.

1/29/2009 11:31:40 PM

This stimulus bill is the equivalent of blood letting. Back in 1900 they had no idea what to do so they bled their patients. No improvement? Bleed them some more. They died? We didn't bleed them soon enough (quoth Mike Munger here on NCState Campus on Wednesday night).

This stimulus bill is only going to move money around; taking it from some to give it to others. The only defensible theory as to how a stimulus bill could work is by giving the Federal Reserve someone to lend to when no one else will borrow. Well, that is a technical situation which is easy to test for and we are not in that situation: while $800 billion is a god-awful sum of money, it is still not enough to run out of private lenders. As such, all it is doing is taking money out of investors hands and put it in the hands of government employees; especially since the vast majority of it is not even going to be borrowed until 2010. As such, it does not in any way help any of the actual problems faced by the American economy. There is no mechanism for this stimulus or any other stimulus (unless you are willing to start WW2 levels of borrowing) to actually stop what little deflation we have.

But what it is going to do is distract America's business class away from productive behavior and towards rent seeking inside the stimulus package, which is going to make Americans poorer and prolong the recession.

As such, doing nothing is far superior to this stimulus.

1/29/2009 11:44:18 PM

Our society was much better off with out gov't intervention. How dare the US govt take away power from the Morgan Chase, Rockefeller, Andrew Carnagie, all the Oil barons, and the meat companies that use to have dead rat corpses in its beef. Monopolies, laborers being forced to work 14 hour work days, little kids getting their arms chopped off in machinery, corporations buying out politicians its the American way dammit. GOVERNMENT KEEP OUT

Quote :

"There is no mechanism for this stimulus or any other stimulus (unless you are willing to start WW2 levels of borrowing) to actually stop what little deflation we have. "

its all psychological. I have heard all this boohooing about the economic package being put together. Sure it has lots of pork taht need to be trimmed. What though do some of you all propose would be a better solution. Letting the free market "work its way out" doesn't necessarily work just ask Herbert Hoover. Even if it does it will take years so what do you suppose we do with all the people unemployed, kicked out of their house, etc until than?

[Edited on January 30, 2009 at 12:01 AM. Reason : k]

[Edited on January 30, 2009 at 12:02 AM. Reason : l]

1/29/2009 11:57:28 PM

Quote :

"its all psychological."

Tell that to the thousands of people who have lost their jobs in the last few weeks. Thousands.

Quote :

"Sure it has lots of pork taht need to be trimmed. What though do some of you all propose would be a better solution."

I don't know...maybe fucking get rid of it? What a brilliant idea.


Look I'm a republican, I do not disagree with everything in this bill. The pork; yeah I expect a certain amount in any bill..."bi-partisan" or not, everything has strings attached. But its out of hand on this one.

We are in the here and now; we made mistakes in the past, all of our administrations have. If this one is about change lets get it right. I didn't vote for Obama but I support him b/c he is our President, I hope and expect that he has ideas that will take us in the right direction. I may not always agree with him but if this is a Stimulus bill then lets see the capital S, so far I haven't seen it.

Hopefully our Senate can put this back where it needs to be.

God bless America

1/30/2009 5:22:17 AM

Quote :

"Tell that to the thousands of people who have lost their jobs in the last few weeks. Thousands."

I think my comment completely flew over your head. Please Try Again

Quote :

" God bless America"

Perhaps if you and Sarah Palin pray harder; God will feel merciful and will miraculously decide to end the current recession.

[Edited on January 30, 2009 at 7:32 AM. Reason : l]

1/30/2009 7:30:59 AM

this was a pretty ridiculous statement.

Quote :

"Perhaps if you and Sarah Palin pray harder; God will feel merciful and will miraculously decide to end the current recession."

the guy makes a fair point and you only want to troll him for making a fairly general and benign statement.

Quote :

"What though do some of you all propose would be a better solution."

limit the bill to ONLY infrastructure, government renovation projects, credit stabilization and tax cuts. PERIOD.

1/30/2009 8:13:54 AM

I honestly don't believe this stimulus package is going to work. The only type of spending congress should do in this economy is ensuring the liquidity of the financial system and creating a temporary safety net for laid off workers so that they have some bit of protection until the economy reaches equilibrium.

Airating the national lawn for 50 million dollars isn't going to provide anything.

1/30/2009 4:53:04 PM

^ I think that's a good idea, but that's socialism...

1/30/2009 5:08:02 PM

^^I agree with you. The Federal Reserve and Unemployment Insurance ARE all that is needed.

1/30/2009 6:32:46 PM

Quote :

"Our society was much better off with out gov't intervention. How dare the US govt take away power from the Morgan Chase, Rockefeller, Andrew Carnagie, all the Oil barons, and the meat companies that use to have dead rat corpses in its beef. Monopolies, laborers being forced to work 14 hour work days, little kids getting their arms chopped off in machinery, corporations buying out politicians its the American way dammit. GOVERNMENT KEEP OUT"

When congress controls buying and selling the first things to be bought and sold are legislators. But if you are at all curious how government really operates, the biggest proponents of regulating the meat industry were the nations largest meat packers. It turns out that every major growth of government economic power has served to boost the profits of those it claimed to regulate. The biggest example in history was the Clean Air Act which doubled the stock price of this nations most egregious polluters by making themselves exempt from the law and outlawing the entry of new competitors.

Quote :

"I have heard all this boohooing about the economic package being put together. Sure it has lots of pork taht need to be trimmed. What though do some of you all propose would be a better solution. Letting the free market "work its way out" doesn't necessarily work just ask Herbert Hoover. Even if it does it will take years so what do you suppose we do with all the people unemployed, kicked out of their house, etc until than?"

Herbert Hoover increased federal spending by over 40%, almost the same amount currently proposed. Herbert Hoover also drastically increased trade barriers, as Obama promised to do during the campaign. All that missing is Herbert Hoover's decrying of banks for not lending and businesses for laying people off.

1/30/2009 10:01:41 PM

^The bill also includes provisions about using the funds only on american iron, steel, and (in one version) manufactured goods. Add in the bonus pay lash outs and we may as well call him President Hoover.

1/31/2009 10:35:33 AM

^
Obama to review 'Buy USA' policy
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/580216

The canadian are apparently really mad aboot this.

1/31/2009 2:19:37 PM

screw canada. let them needlessly bailout their OWN companies like everybody else!

1/31/2009 2:48:31 PM

I'm for this package but I also agree that it needs to be revised quite a bit. $350 Million for child care on military bases is a little crazy. And what is the $335 Million for preventing STD's? Paying for sod on the mall should also not be anywhere near this package.

What does 'infrastructure' mean when they have 90 billion allocated to it? Is this roads and bridges?

2/2/2009 1:59:19 PM

infrastructure is supposed to be fast-track projects like roads, bridges, water treatment, etc...

2/2/2009 3:09:40 PM

and its less than 10% of the bill.


Repubs launched thier own plan, which using obamas own economic strategists formula, would create twice as many jobs at half the costs. Of course, I dont have any faith in anyone up there or what they say, I would rather they do nothing other than temp extend some unemployment benefits.

2/2/2009 3:39:41 PM

Not that I agree with a lot of the pork involved in the current stimulus package but Ruben Narvarrette from CNN is a complete idiot. He must be attempting to win the "minority with Conservative views" niche. During his rant about the stimulus package he goes into a rant about the money going to making family planning and birth control more avaliable...

Quote :

"Another such item, which was removed from the bill, was a plan to spend more than $200 million on birth control funding as a way of stimulating the economy..."

Quote :

"Another such item, which was removed from the bill, was a plan to spend more than $200 million on birth control funding as a way of stimulating the economy..."

Quote :

"There is nothing more private -- that is, none of the government's business -- than the personal decision that a family makes about how many children to have..."

Quote :

" For a minute, it sounded as if the House speaker was channeling the ghost of Margaret Sanger. ... But there is more. Sanger also embraced birth control as a means of social engineering. She was a leader in the eugenics movement, which had a number of influential supporters. ... they felt that these groups were having too many children, a trend they believed needed to be stopped -- by forced sterilization if necessary. "

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/02/navarrette.stimulus/index.html

Is this guy an idiot or is he mad at the potential of slowing down the exponential growth of his minority group in the US.

It does not matter if you agree or not with the gov't funding birth control. Either way how does one warp this into an argument about eugenics and sterilizations. NO BODY WOULD BE FORCED TO GO ON BIRTH CONTROL.

Yes perhaps this legislation should not be part of a "stimulus package" but it is legislation, during a time when fixing the economy is not priority, that should be considered. I see nothing wrong with making birth control readily avaliable cheap for those who would otherwise not be able to afford it. I would almost argue it would have more benefits to the individuals and society as a whole beyond the obvious; less money spent on welfare babies and such.

As an added bonus, abortion would surely drop along with obvious decreases in teen pregnancy and people having unwanted children out of wedlock.

Narvette must be Pro-Life Pro unwanted pregnancy. or have stock in abortion clinics.

[Edited on February 2, 2009 at 5:09 PM. Reason : a]

[Edited on February 2, 2009 at 5:10 PM. Reason : a]

2/2/2009 5:03:58 PM

So why aren't they supporting a payroll tax cut?

2/7/2009 4:20:46 AM

most people feel the govt will never temp. get rid of a payroll tax bc people are used to paying it and will realise just how much money is being taken from thier paycheck. For instance you know about what your paycheck is now every couple weeks. So if you have a couple extra hundred all of a sudden it will be hard to take it back. (its kinda reverse entitlment syndrome, except you worked for your money)

If you like the idea of not paying payroll tax, income, or being taxed on your savings kiwi, I would encourage you to go to http://www.fairtax.org read up on it and push your congressman to support it or vote for ones that do.

2/7/2009 9:14:26 AM