In a late-night Senate session, the 1.2 trillion-dollar stimulus package insisted upon by Obama and the Democrats barely squeaked by the Senate with just the 60 votes needed for approval.
Unfortunately, the robust conservative campaign to stop the bill by bombarding the offices of the 3 Republican turncoats--Specter, Snowe, and Collins--was to no avail. All 3 voted in favor of this national outrage.
The good news is that the vast majority of Republicans in Congress held firm against this bill. The package didn't get a single GOP vote in the House and only 3 in the Senate. This is a Democrat-Obama bill from top to bottom, and they will have to pay the piper when it fails.
But the bad news is that the country just allowed its elected representatives to send its heritage, its values, its principles, and its soul down the river. Democrats who sponsored that bill admitted repeatedly on Friday that they had no idea what was in the bill since they had not read it. Yet they took to the floor of Congress to denounce those with some intelligence who prefer to actually read legislation before casting a vote. And they themselves voted en mass to approve a bill they had not read.
How's that for prudence, responsibility, and professionalism?
We obviously have a Congress that is run by clowns, and the chief clown is in the White House.
But the American citizens will be the ones, unfortunately, left holding the bag when the payment comes due on this astronomical spending spree.
And what we do know about this bill is enough to make any thinking person wince.
Senior adults will have their healthcare rationed and withheld if they are deemed too old and sick to justify the cost of treating them. Yes, that's in the bill.
Gun rights are under attack in the bill as veterans will be forced to register with a national registry in order to buy a firearm.
The fraudulent group ACORN got 50 billion dollars to continue their ruse as a 'voter registration organization,' when in actuality they are a partisan Obama promotion gang.
Governors of states that refuse to accept stimulus money in the bill will be punished, such as South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, a fiscal conservative who decries the wasteful spending in the bill.
And this is only a small sampling. Billions more are going toward liberal pet projects that will do nothing but help Democrats get elected in the next election cycle.
I hate to sound pessimistic, my friends, but at this point the future of the country looks dire. It will be a miracle if we survive unless we find a way to oust the traitors in Congress in 2010, if we make it until then.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
Will the stimulus bill compromise lower your tax rebate to $8 per week? That appears to be true. The final version has not been passed, but reports indicate the $500 per year in reduced tax withholding has been reduced to $400 per individual and $800 per couple. That only comes to $8 per week for an individual and $16 for a couple. If they start the payments in June and make it retroactive to the beginning of the year, you will get $13 per week until next January. Then, your rebate would drop to the $8 per week level. Are you felling stimulated yet? In a stimulus bill of almost $1 trillion dollars, you would think President Obama would have more for the working class.
Have you ever stained a dried-out, scorched-in-the-sun-for-years wooden deck? The first application is absorbed so quickly it almost doesn't look as though it's been stained at all. The wood literally drinks up the stain as fast as you apply it. In order for this exercise to be beneficial at all, it usually requires two or three applications.
The dried out deck is the U.S. economy and the stain is over $900 billion that will be absorbed as quickly as it is distributed. And then each month and quarter we will wait and watch for signs. Signs that the economy has stopped contracting. Signs that jobless claims are retreating. We have to stop this runaway train from going south before it can begin to travel north again. And that takes time - and patience.
Last Saturday, in an effort to come to a resolution about applying stain to this economy, Congress was in session. And at least one Senator made the point that this would not be a quick fix. Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) appealed to her colleagues for patience - a much needed virtue during this current American Crisis. The last major American Crisis lasted almost 16 years - from October 29, 1929 to August 14, 1945. No one can predict the length and depth of this Crisis, but it won't be quick and recovery will most likely be measured in years for a number of reasons:
A mature U.S. economy. The economy is mature and has been growing at ever-decreasing rates since the 1960s. The U.S. economy is mostly made up of mature corporations, which translates into mature industries, and roll up into mature sectors. Sure there are less-mature growth segments, but they are either not big enough yet (biotech) or are not growing fast enough, or strong enough to greatly impact a $14.3 trillion economy. This makes recovery much harder.
A major consumer mindshift. Consumers have slammed on the spending brakes. Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCEs) make up about 70 percent of U.S. GDP. The rate of PCE growth has been in decline since the 1960s (1960s-4.44%, 1970s- 3.51%, 1980s-3.30%, 1990s-3.25%, 2000s-2.82%) and that decline has only accelerated during the 2000s. Over the last five years, the rate of PCE growth has gone from 3.6% in 2003 to 0.3% in 2008 - with the last two quarters of 2008 registering negative growth rates. And early signs for 2009 do not look good. The U.S. auto industry - coming off its worst year ever - sold almost 40% fewer cars in January 2009 that it did in January 2008. The bottom line: consumers have reined in spending - probably the right thing for them to do personally, but crippling to the economy.
As the largest generation in history ages, it leaves its days of conspicuous consumption behind it. As Boomers retire and/or die, an enormous PCE engine dies with them, replaced by younger generations that get by on less and are increasingly choosing a life built on quality, not quantity. They watched their Boomer parents kill themselves as productivity machines in exchange for more money and a higher standard of living. Just as Boomers did not want to live the lives their parents did, Gen Xers and Millennials do not want to live the lives their Boomer parents did.
So to echo the call of Arkansas Senator Lincoln, we all must be patient. But combined with patience we need to concurrently redefine the measurement of success on so many levels. Our economy must not be measured against historical levels going forward or we will be terribly disappointed for a very long time. It's time to adjust expectations and build a better life on less - a lesson that companies such as General Motors have remarkably yet to learn.
The U.S. economy is no longer a heel-clicking youngster. It's our aging uncle who sometimes falls asleep on the couch when he comes to visit. He may not be capable of running the New York Marathon anymore, but we don't love him any less and we make the most of the time we have left with him.
We will get through this economic winter and on to a glorious spring of expansion. But don't look for the economic equivilent of groundhog Punxsutawney Phil to accurately forecast an early spring. Winter is here and we'd better get used to it.
www.boomerdestiny.com/blog
Boomer, your analogy comparing the American economy to an aging uncle is about as pessimistic a thing as I've seen yet. It is as if you and the supporters of government bailouts are saying it has one foot in the grave, and only government can save it...but since it is so old, government will continue to have to save it, over and over.
I don't buy it.
This is NOT the worst crisis since the great depression. I lived through the Carter years, 1976- 1981. Anyone who says this is as bad as that is simply lying.
And if the good Senator from Arkansas truly believed in 'patience,' then why the rush to pass a stimulus bill so quickly? Even before ANY of them read the thing!
Jeez. The country is going to hell in a handbasket unless we get rid of these nutcases like your Arkansas Senator.
She is my senator, but I hope we can change that.
She's your Senator? Dang. You have my sympathy.
Post a Comment