Here’s the press release.
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Posts tagged as:
stimulus
You could probably have figured this out by now. The more liberal economist is saying the stimulus was not big enough and another infusion will be needed to get the economy fully on track. The more conservative economist is saying the stimulus has been a disaster and is not working, proving that big government is bad.
The snipping is all well and good. Those less likely to inject politics into the mix admit the stimulus is working to, um, stimulate the economy despite it’s failings:
But with roughly a quarter of the stimulus money out the door after nine months, the accumulation of hard data and real-life experience has allowed more dispassionate analysts to reach a consensus that the stimulus package, messy as it is, is working.
Jobs savings and creation are on track. The recession didn’t turn into a depression. By all accounts we are beginning the slow – and painful – turnaround. Government spending did indeed prevent the Republican fueled economy from eating itself. The policies of 8 years of Bush are going to take some time to fix. You don’t turn such things around in 100 days, much less a year in office. As we pointed out in our recent Palin book signing camp out video, those who voted for George W. Bush fucked up the country and they can’t have it back…at least until we fix it.
One of the nice young fellas in the video (the one who duct taped over McCain on his McCain-Palin tee – duct tape boy we’ll call him) got into an extended argument with us about the cost of the stimulus being greater than the Iraq war. Again, the stimulus cost $787 billion. Cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars so far? $915 billion.
Now, if you want to argue the relative importance of such spending of taxpayer money, I’m all ears. I, for one, would much rather like to spend it on jobs for American families than bombs for Iraq. Especially when you consider the payback. Iraq and Afghanistan will most likely fall back into old patterns of rogue nations and failed states. The cost benefit analysis of such a fools errand in Iraq has always been highly questionable, even at the start.
The interesting thing about the stimulus is that a concession to Republicans took $70 billion of the impact out (emphasis mine):
Even the $787 billion price tag overstates the plan’s stimulus value given changes made in Congress, economists say. Nearly a tenth of the package, $70 billion, comes from a provision adjusting the alternative minimum tax so it does not hit middle-income taxpayers this year. That routine fix, which would do nothing to stimulate the economy, was added in part to seek Republican votes. But to keep the package’s overall cost down, provisions that would stimulate the economy — like aid to revenue-starved states and infrastructure projects — got less as a result.
Hey wingnuts. Want your country back? You can’t have it. You fucked it up. You might get it back just in time to fuck it up again after we fix it.
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My friends at the Alliance for American Manufacturing directed me to this depressing article on the “Fastest Dying Cities” from Forbes. It says that Youngstown, Canton, Dayton and Cleveland are among the “worst” cities.
Luckily, AAM also linked me to this video about how this destruction of my home state can be reversed:
It looks like the federal government is extending a hand, but where are the companies – and the jobs? The fact that 84% of the stimulus money set aside for investing in clean energy has gone to foreign companies tells me something is lacking in our corporations and entrepreneurs (not to mention in the legislation)!
I know we can do better.
And unless everyone in Ohio simply wants to decide between a career as a stockbroker or a hamburger-flipper, we’d better speed things up. (Watch the 3-minute video to hear one of my heroes, Leo Gerard, on this career choice!)
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Surprise! Surprise! Surprise! So much for conservative ideology:
The list of governors threatening to decline federal stimulus money last month read like a list of Republicans considering running for president in 2012: Govs. Mark Sanford, Bobby Jindal and Sarah Palin led the anti-stimulus charge.
But what began with a bang is ending with something closer to a whimper. All three of those governors have been forced to scale back their expectations, to varying degrees, as the push of conservative philosophy gave way to the pull of political reality.
All three found that praise from the conservative movement in Washington meant nothing to furious state legislators of both parties. And in the end, along with other conservative Republican governors, the three submitted letters in recent days asking to be eligible for federal funds, a spokesman for the White House Office of Management and Budget confirmed.
Wonder if they’ll get teabagged too? ROFL
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NEW YORK (Reuters) – In an ironic twist, public anger about massive bonuses at bailed-out insurer American International Group may have helped big investors land a sweeter deal in the U.S. government’s latest financial rescue plan.
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Did I get this right? Did the all seeing, all hearing, MahaRushie just call the tea party whackjobs lynch mobs? Surely not:
“A lynch mob is expanding: the peasants with their pitchforks surrounding the corporate headquarters of AIG, demanding heads. Death threats are pouring in. All of this being ginned up by the Obama administration.” Limbaugh later claimed, “This $500,000 limit on executive pay — let me tell you why it won’t work. New York City will die. New York City needs a whole bunch of people being paid a whole lot of money, so they can tax their butts off, so that the city can maintain its stupid streets, potholes, and welfare state. Without the super wealthy in New York, it’s over. … This — it’s just a populist ruse. It’s just designed to people go, ‘Yeah, yeah!’“
So are these teabaggers protesting the Bush/Paulson stimulus or obscene executive bonuses at AIG? Can someone clear me up on this one?
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So the Republican talking point is that AIG never should have been given any money and the stimulus should have never been passed.
The Democratic talking point is that AIG executives should not be so greedy.
Rinse. Repeat.
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…and the right is silent. You can’t cry socialism when you also have to cry support the troops! Heh. If that’s not enough to chap the ass of your average wingnut then get this:
“The stimulus package will fund Ohio National Guard renewable energy projects, installing solar panels at locations in Columbus, Toledo and at the Camp Ravenna Joint Military Training Center in Newton Falls,” said Maj. Gen Gregory L. Wayt, the adjutant general. “These projects will save the National Guard about $78,000 in utility costs within the first year of operation, and will generate about 375,000 Kilowatt hours of electricity per year.”
You hear that? We’re installing solar panels on National Guard buildings!
…oh the times they are a a change-in!
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We all knew he was lying. It was clear from the full context of White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs’ quote which Rick tried to use to say he was being threatened by the Obama administration after his rant against the stimulus bill on CNBC. Funny thing is now he is backing way off the claims that he was threatened. Matt Lauer puts the heat on Santelli and he folds like a cheap tent:
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Around 3:00 in the above video Santelli claims “I’m not saying threatening…”
Yet to G. Gordon Liddy he clearly said threatening:
SANTELLI: He started that press conference saying, “I don’t know where he lives, I don’t know where his house is.” This is the Press Secretary of the White House. Is that the kind of thing we want? Is that —
LIDDY: It’s a veiled threat.
SANTELLI: It really is. […] I don’t really want to be a spokesman, but I really am very proud of a) the response I’m getting, which is overwhelmingly positive, and b) discourse, that is debate. That if the pressure and the heat I’m taking from the White House – the fact my kids are nervous to go to school – I can take that, okay.
Liar. Plain and simple. Got caught. You can’t get away with this kind of crap anymore Ricky. Wise up.
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The conservative hack group American Issues Project has a new hilarious ad out that is set to run on cable starting tomorrow. Guess how much they are going to spend on it? You guessed it. A million dollars!
If you recognize the voice, it’s the same one in this AIP smear ad that attempted to defeat Obama at the 11th hour in the 2008 Presidential Race:
Neither one worked. That they are able to weave Jesus into their opposition of the stimulus is just…well…hilarious!
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If you need to know anything about Republicanism, this is all you need to read. In fighting Obama’s stimulus bill aimed at digging us out of the hole George W. Bush and his buddies in the Republican Party left us, here is what they fought to exclude:
In a key reduction from the bill that reached the Senate floor earlier in the week, $40 billion would be cut from a “fiscal stabilization fund” for state governments’ education costs, though $14 billion to boost the maximum for college Pell Grants by $400 to $5,250 would be preserved, as would aid to local school districts for the No Child Left Behind law and special education.
A plan to help the unemployed purchase health insurance would be reduced to a 50 percent subsidy instead of two-thirds.
This is the definition of the Republican Party. At a time when we find ourselves at historic lows only matched and exceeded by the Great Depression itself, Republicans fight to lower the education (and economic productivity by extension) and aid to those who have lost their jobs. So know what it is that makes these people tick. Remember it. We are in the shit and these people want to CUT EDUCATION and HEALTH CARE FOR THE UNEMPLOYED.
Keep on truckin’ to total irrelevance people. I love it!
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