Comments on: A Stimulus, Yes, But At What Cost?

By: Bob from Ohio

Bob from Ohio — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 02:31:51 +0000

Scorn or anger. Whatever you call it, if the bill was such a winner, glee at the GOP’s stupidity would be the expected response. Not seeing that though.

By: Bob from Ohio

Bob from Ohio — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 02:30:27 +0000

Aaron, not to mention the constant harping on deficits by the Dems. Now deficits don’t matter one bit.

President PA is spending in one day what President Bush spent in 7 years in two wars.

By: Aaron

Aaron — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 23:01:32 +0000

So, were the Democrats deserving of scorn when they viewed military failure as the key to their political success for the last six years?

By: Jacques Distler

Jacques Distler — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 21:17:41 +0000

Anger, Bob? Scorn is more like it. If, as you seem to believe, economic failure is the key to Republican political success, then that scorn is richly deserved.

By: Mark

Mark — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 20:57:13 +0000

We saw what happened the last time we got railroaded into passing a huge economic bill – the $700 billion in TARP funds. That really worked out well, didn’t it?…Perhaps a little more time crafting a bill that actually had accountability and a well-defined purpose would have been useful…but the Bush administration officials turned up the heat, and Congress jumped – and Obama has employed the very same tactics here…

By: Bob from Ohio

Bob from Ohio — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 20:56:18 +0000

Sherrod Brown thing is of no political consequence

We’ll see in 2012 if that is the case. Brown is now the decisive vote for PorkFest 2009. When he runs for re-election, if PorkFest 2009 has not worked it’s magic on the economy, then his melodramatic flight will be wrapped around Brown’s neck.

Again, if this bill is such an economic and political winner, why all the anger at the GOP?

By: Mark

Mark — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 20:54:32 +0000

Certainly, it’s true that Sherrod Brown’s travails are of little consequence (not to him, of course, but to the nation) – but that little brouhaha is symptomatic of the push to ram this thing through – no thinking! No delay! House on fire! Catastrophe! Here’s a bucket full of $800 billion – maybe – just maybe – that will put the fire out…

This is no way to run the country in the best of times…but certainly not in the worst…

By: Jacques Distler

Jacques Distler — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 20:46:20 +0000

The Sherrod Brown thing is of no political consequence. It was an opportunity for the Senate Republicans (or, more precisely one Senate Republican) to show some class and be magnanimous by doing something which would have zero political cost. That they chose not to avail themselves of the opportunity is the least of their sins.

By: Mark

Mark — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 20:26:20 +0000

As for Peter’s comment about the tax relief taking some time to have an effect, yes, it will…try forever. $13 a check? That’s Obama’s middle-class tax break? That’s an insult, and worse, a complete waste of money when we have no business wasting money, in that $13 a check is almost worthless to the individual receiving it, but enormously expensive when multiplied across the country…I can’t imagine a tax break package that would be LESS effective at stimulating the economy that this one…

By: Mark

Mark — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 20:23:47 +0000

Jacques, debating the particulars of a hypothetical stimulus bill since November is not the same as debating the particulars of a very particular piece of legislation that no one in Washington, Democrat or Republican, even had the time to read…Steve’s point is very well taken: the only reason Sherrod Brown had to rush back from his mother’s wake was to meet an arbitrary deadline that looks foolish when the President goes on a three-day holiday. There would have been not a whit of difference if this bill was passed Tuesday, instead of Friday, except one: it would have given three additional days for legislative aides to have actually digested the bill’s contents…and that’s a bad thing?

You can beat up the Republicans for many things, and be in the right – but you can’t hang the Sherrod Brown thing around their neck…that’s the fault of President Obama and the Senate leadership…