A few kudos for some Democrats

[Brugdor]

Kudos to Senate Democrats and specifically Claire McCaskill for planning to take some more pork out of the stimulus bill. The link goes to another positive story about McCaskill as she's the one behind capping CEO pay at companies who've accepted corporate welfare from the government. I think both are positive moves and certainly have strong public support. The stimulus currently is down to 37% approval according to a Rasmussen poll. Republican efforts to block the bill are pretty meaningless considering they never once bothered to cut pork out of any budgets they came up with while they were in power. So it's pretty obvious it's just a political stunt. One that may work in our favor but a stunt none the less.

Also, kudos to Obama for increasing the military budget by 8%. It would have been easy to come in and start making cuts to appease the far left portion of his base but to his credit he's not going to jeopardize the war effort by doing so.

[Celest]

Well just to mention: It isnt an 'inherant' left thing to reduce the military budget.

If you are going off of Clinton then you have to look at the actual situation that he came into... EG Paying for coldwar size military when there was no longer a cold war. Many people blast him for that but it was one of the main ways that he was able to come clost to stabalizing the deficit. There's plenty to attack the man on but I always have to laugh when people chose that to attack him with.

[Brugdor]

Well just to mention: It isnt an 'inherant' left thing to reduce the military budget.

If you are going off of Clinton then you have to look at the actual situation that he came into... EG Paying for coldwar size military when there was no longer a cold war. Many people blast him for that but it was one of the main ways that he was able to come clost to stabalizing the deficit. There's plenty to attack the man on but I always have to laugh when people chose that to attack him with.

It wasn't a knock on Clinton. It was just what I said it was which is kudos for Obama on a good choice.

[Celest]

Ah ok..

Not that I have any love for Clinton but I just know that usually when someone mentions something in the way you did.. it's typically targeted at Clinton.

[Brugdor]

A Blue Dog comes up with an alternative to the pork filled version of the stimulus bill.  Rep. Walt Minnick's (D-ID) version only costs $170 billion.

http://hotair.com/archives/2009/02/10/freshman-blue-dog-offers-a-new-start/


Also, if you have the time to read a great article regarding the stimulus, the NYT had one *shock* the other day. It talks about a similar stimulus that Japan passed a while back that was a huge failure. The interesting parts IMO were that all the Japanese seem to say the bill was a waste of money. All of the Americans quoted seem to think it was great. So evidently the NYT went out of its way to find economists here that agree with Obama. Basically this part shows how wrong the Democrats are regarding the stimulus.

Another thing to note though is that the one type of spending the Japanese said did some good is the type of spending the Republicans are putting under the definition of pork. This would be things like aquariums that generate jobs and money for a very long time. So this shows how wrong the Republicans are regarding the stimulus.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/06/world/asia/06japan.html?_r=1&em


Personally I'm of the belief that we should do nothing and let the economy balance itself out again. It will be a painful few years but it will be much shorter and much better than what's going to happen if the stimulus passes. At some point we've got to pay off this debt and making it much worse isn't a solution IMO. It's just putting off the inevitable.

[Hoopy Frood]

Personally I'm of the belief that we should do nothing and let the economy balance itself out again. It will be a painful few years but it will be much shorter and much better than what's going to happen if the stimulus passes. At some point we've got to pay off this debt and making it much worse isn't a solution IMO. It's just putting off the inevitable.

I'm pretty much of that opinion as well. As much as the talking heads say otherwise, I'm not buying it, since they are a not insignificant part of why we're in this mess in the first place.

[Brugdor]

Well this obviously doesn't apply to the original purpose of this thread but it turned towards the financial situation so...

You're doing a heck of a job, Timmeh!

Cleansing the financial system of these assets, which are backed by failing mortgages and other troubled loans, has vexed officials since Congress approved the $700 billion rescue package in October. But financial analysts said Geithner, who took a strong hand in casting the new plan, appeared to have no better grasp on a solution than his predecessor, Henry M. Paulson Jr.

"What they did is over-promise and under-deliver," said Thomas Barrack, chief executive of Colony Capital, a private investment firm in Los Angeles. "They said there was going to be a plan, so everybody expected a plan. And there was nothing."

Minutes after the plan was made public, stock markets plummeted. The Dow Jones industrial average ended the day down 4.6 percent. The Standard and Poor's 500-stock index, a broader measure, fell 4.9 percent.

More at link

At least Geithner plays by UV rules. There is no "the plan".