www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Re: Stimulus/Recovery and Reinvestment Plan

In the last few weeks the Obama Administration has been pushing the Stimulus/Reinvestment Plan as absolutely necessary to pass quickly (correct me if I am wrong) or this country may further slide into economic disaster. I looked up the White House website and cut/paste the outline of the Recovery and Reinvestment Plan and post it here for this forum.

My question is why didn't the President divide the stimulus plan from the Reinvestment plan. I find nothing in the Reinvestment part of the Act that can't wait for proper debate. If you buy the idea that we NEED a stimulus plan to save our economy and that it is absolutely necessary then why not just propose a separate stimulus package first and then propose the Reinvestment Act at a later time for consideration!? The items in the Plan should be debated on in Congress just as you would any other major piece of legislation .Lets be honest, Obama Plan will spend up to $800 billion dollars of tax payers money! Is it possible that the Obama Administration is tying the stimulus idea and reinvestment idea together so they can get it passed without much debate? After all we absolutely need a new stimulus package because the other stimulus packages worked so well!(Please forgive my sarcasm)Below is main points of the Recovery and Reinvestment Act. What do you all think? Let's frame this discussion as a freindly but honest!

THE PRESIDENT'S AMERICAN RECOVERY AND REINVESTMENT PLAN
With each passing day, families across America are watching their bills pile up and their savings disappear.
President Obama believes that if we do not act quickly, this recession could linger for years – and America could lose the competitive edge that has served as the foundation for our strength and standing in the world.
That's why the President has put forth an American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan that will jumpstart job creation and long-term growth by:
• Doubling the production of alternative energy in the next three years.
• Modernizing more than 75% of federal buildings and improve the energy efficiency of two million American homes, saving consumers and taxpayers billions on our energy bills.
• Making the immediate investments necessary to ensure that within five years, all of America’s medical records are computerized.
• Equipping tens of thousands of schools, community colleges, and public universities with 21st century classrooms, labs, and libraries.
• Expanding broadband across America, so that a small business in a rural town can connect and compete with their counterparts anywhere in the world.
• Investing in the science, research, and technology that will lead to new medical breakthroughs, new discoveries, and entire new industries.
On January 8th, 2009 -- less than two weeks before taking office -- President Obama spoke on the need for urgent action on his American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan to save or create over 3 million jobs while investing in priorities like health care, energy, and education that will jump start economic growth. The plan represents not just a new policy, but a new approach to meeting our most urgent challenges.
The full text of the President's address is below.
Phil D.

Just a quick comment. If one reinforces irresponsibility, as this so called stimulus package does, it will only encourage irresponsibility. I predict that we have a long difficult road ahead of us as we head toward the black hole of Socialism.

Lord, have mercy.

CDL

Christ is in our midst!! He is and always will be!!

I admit upfront that I am not the sharpest tool in the shed.

Can anyone tell me how any of these proposals will immediately put anyone to work who has lost his job in the past year or will lose it in the coming year?

Investments are always long term and they take years to bear fruit.

Many of these proposals sound like the typical federal program to shift monies from one segment of the economy to another. Government has done this for years with little effect on the actual creation of jobs/careers/sustainable ways for a person to make a career and support himself and his family.

I notice that there is no mention of the Small Business Administration or expansion of its loan program that helps people establish businesses and hire other people to help them make a go of it.

Somehow I have the creepy feeling that we've been here before. Lyndon Johnson started the Great Society and pumped up the Vietnam War without a way to fund both together--via a tax increase. He printed money. So the ability of a head of household to earn enough with one income to sustain a family went out the door over the next two decades while inflation beat the American people into Third World citizens. I well remember double digit inflation in the 1970s and how it affected the ability to buy groceries week-to-week. Now it takes two incomes just to keep body and soul together. How will people do it when the ante is upped?

We're already borrowed to the hilt with IOUs to the Chinese, but we're going to spend so much money few can wrap their heads around what the amounts really mean.

Will someone be so kind as to explain this to me?

BOB

I agree with CDL on this issue... it's a spending and not a stimulus package

Yes it's shame President Obama has made such a shambles of the economy after George Bush left it in such great shape.

DAVIDinVA:

No one's saying that. In fact, the worst part of any political discussion concerning the economy is the custom of either blaming or congratulating the sitting president for either the failure or success.

Just as no politician can create a single job that lasts, no politician can do more than meddle in the economy, hoping to make it do what he wants it to do.

We can only hope that all this spending can do some good. But given the fact that the first 350 billion has had no effect and hasn't moved out into the economy yet I apprehensive about the effect if any. To blame the president isn't fair.

I do hope that some good comes out of this, but given past experience I'm not holding my breath.

BOB

As I'd be shocked if you did not know, stimulus plans do not work no matter who proposes them. It would not matter if George Washington were to come back to life and he were to support them. They do not work. It does not make any difference who proposes them they don't work. They are simply spending plans. They don't work. Mr. Nixon was wrong to say "We are all Keynesians now" and he was wrong for two reasons. We weren't then and we are now all Keynesians. He was wrong to suppose that that economic system actually worked. Jimmy Carter was wrong. Mr. Bush was wrong and Mr. Obama is doubly wrong because he's doubling the amount of funny money he's throwing down a rat hole.

Whether you understand the economic issue or not please don't side track it to an issue of party politics. Keynes was wrong because it leads to bridges going nowhere that produce no appreciable help for the economy.

There's not much we can do about it except to pray and to help pick up the pieces of broken lives while this disaster made by greed by everyone plays out.

CDL

Don't let Congress off the hook...they ain't innocent

Ain't it the truth?

Actually I think that people are on the right track. Did you see the stats on how much people are now saving? The way you build up the wealth lost is to spend less than you make. Liek my grandparents and great grandparents used to say--Live on half and save half. Now that might be very difficult in the current climate, but to say that you make due with a great deal less than you make is always a good rule. Then when things really get tight, you've already been living with a tight belt and have a little to fall back on.

When people save, our national wealth will grow and that which was lost in the crash will be replaced.

Again, as with so many other issues, what I do down here "where the rubber meets the road" to improve the lot of or maintain the lot of my own family is the key to the future. Presidents and politicians--God bless them--don't really have much impact unless they tax my thrift away.

BOB

The trend has been for many years, to put money into the financial sector, and let manufacturing perish. That seems backwards to me. Perhaps there are more vested interests in Congress with wealth dependent on the financial sector, who knows? However, if you really want to help the economy, send money to Charles. I promise I will spend it and put Americans to work. My first purchase will be a chocolate manufacturing facility.

Worth taking a look at!

February 3, 2009
An Earmark by Any Other Name Is Still an Earmark
by Karen Campbell, Ph.D.
WebMemo #2264

An analysis of H.R. 1, also known as "the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009," passed by the House of Representatives, shows that it fails to deliver on the economic promises of its authors, does not help the economy recover, and--worst of all--decreases investment rather than stimulating reinvestment.

Economists in the Center for Data Analysis at The Heritage Foundation used a widely respected model of the U.S. economy, the IHS Global Insight U.S. Macroeconomic Model, to estimate the economic effects of H.R. 1. Simulation results show:

* The 10 year average increase in GDP is only $72 billion;
* The 10-year average number of jobs created is 616,000; and
* Non-residential investment, which drives sustainable growth, actually decreases by an average $3.1 billion.

Debt should be used only to purchase assets that are income-producing--that is, assets that earn a return greater then the cost of borrowing. If the borrowed money cannot be paid back from the additional income produced by the investment, then the debt becomes a burden on the existing income steam. Many Americans have experienced this economic reality firsthand, and yet the nation's leadership is contemplating assuming this kind of debt--only on a much larger scale.

Borrowing close to $1 trillion to purchase a hodgepodge of appropriation earmarks not only does nothing to stimulate the economy, but it will actually further weaken the U.S. economy.

The Congressional Budget Office estimated the outlays over the next 10 years for each of the various spending and revenue categories. Using these estimates and outlay categories, analysts at The Heritage Foundation simulated the macroeconomic effects of H.R. 1. The simulation used a large structural econometric model of the U.S. economy.[1]

The results of H.R. 1 are compared to the tax simplification and reduction plan proposed by The Heritage Foundation in Table 1.[2] Both plans were simulated using the same model.

The maximum number of jobs created in any one year over the 10-year period from 2009 to 2018 by H.R. 1 is 1.6 million; this maximum does not occur until 2011. The largest increase in GDP comes in 2010 at $173 billion. Thereafter, GDP increases drop off considerably despite the government's continued borrowing and spending. The 10-year Treasury note--one measure of borrowing costs--is on average 0.5 percentage points higher throughout this time period. By 2012, the higher cost of borrowing starts diminishing investments, causing investments to be significantly less than the baseline.

Investments are a key driver of economic growth because they are made in anticipation of the investment improving productivity. The return on investment is the higher income created by the increase in the real quantity of output or the increase in the real quality of output. Higher income allows the investor to pay back the debt plus interest and still have additional income as a reward for taking the investment risk and growing the economy.

Since the government's revenue comes from taxes on the income produced in the private sector, government borrowing relies on the underlying productivity of the national economy in order to repay the principal plus interest on its debt. The lower level of new investments weakens the productivity of the economy making the H.R. 1 spending spree even more burdensome as interest and principal on this debt comes due.

A National Burden

H.R. 1 does not stimulate the economy. Indeed, by the CBO's estimates, most of the spending will occur well after the economy would have recovered on its own.

This government consumption spending creates a debt burden as lower investment spending diminishes the income streams available to pay the principle and interest on the debt. The debt will either have to be repaid with existing income streams or rolled over at higher interest rates. Consequently, investors will have to forego even more productivity-producing investments.

Rather than helping the economy recover, this bill further weakens the economy.

Appendix: Methodology

Analysts used the IHS/Global Insight model[3] of the U.S. economy and their October baseline[4] to simulate the effects of H.R. 1. The assumptions were based on the "Congressional Budget Office Cost Estimate: Bill HR-1: The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act" of January 30, 2009.

The spending categories[5] were placed into one of five aggregate variables used by the model: government non-defense consumption, government defense consumption, non-Medicare transfers to state and local government, Medicare transfers to state and local government, and cyclical federal transfers to individuals. These variables were increased by the amounts and years[6] specified by the CBO report.

The revenue effects were estimated by their effect on the average effective tax rate. This was calculated by reducing the "personal income tax receipts" variable in the model by the amount of the CBO-estimated revenue loss. The ratio of the effective tax rate to the previous tax receipts was used to estimate the H.R. 1 effective tax rate. The tax credits lowered the average effective tax rate by approximately 1–3 percent per quarter.

Lastly, the variable estimating the federal debt held by the public was increased by the amount of the deficit created in each year as estimated by the CBO report. The model was then run and the results obtained.[7]

Karen A. Campbell, Ph.D., is a Policy Analyst in Macroeconomics in the Center for Data Analysis at The Heritage Foundation.

[1]See the appendix for details.

[2]J. D. Foster and William W. Beach, "Economic Recovery: How Best to End the Recession," Heritage Foundation WebMemo No. 2191, January 26, 2009, at http://www.heritage.org/Research/Economy/wm2191.cfm.

[3]For information about the details and operation of the Global Insight U.S. Macroeconomic Model, see "Description of the Global Insight Short-Term U.S. Macroeconomic Model," at http://www.heritage.org/cda/upload/globalinsightmodel.pdf .

[4]The October baseline was chosen because baselines after this month began including stimulus spending by the federal government. Therefore, some effects would already be built into the baseline, which would have caused a type of double counting.

[5]The only "spending" that was not included in the model is the direct spending provision for health information technology. It was unclear how this provision would be implemented. The total amount of this appropriation is $20.2 billion. Its effect in the model would most likely be negligible.

[6]The CBO report estimated outlays in 2019. The baseline used for the simulation went to 2018 only. The additional spending in 2019 was $3.3 million. This would have an insignificant effect on the model results.

[7]Detailed results and assumption calculations are available upon request.


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Sustainable Economic Stimulus: Repeal Capital Gains and Dividend Taxes by Karen Campbell, Ph.D. and Guinevere Nell
February 03, 2009

An Earmark by Any Other Name Is Still an Earmark by Karen Campbell, Ph.D.
February 03, 2009

Big Gains for the Automakers from Senator Jim DeMint's "American Option" by William W. Beach
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And you said you weren't very sharp.... Sounds like you are on top of it to me.

The "Stimulus" bill is mostly pork. Most of it is reward money for unions and other organizations that supported Democrats. Most of it designed to arrive just in time for the 2010 elections so that Democrats can get re-elected.

The only good thing is that they dropped Nancy Pilosi's $300 million to Planned Parenthood for "reproductive services" (contraception and abortion). She actually went on television and spoke about how "reproductive services" stimulate the economy by reducing the number of children! And she knows Catholic theology better then the pope!

Here's some of the pork. None of it really stimulates the economy. Any jobs created will need permanent government funding to last beyond the 4 years of this spending.

Growing government and spreading socialism never helps an economy recover from a recession.

The Wall Street Journal reported that only 5 cents of every dollar spent is for real stimulus.

VARIOUS LEFT-WINGERY:

1. $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts

2. $380 million in the Senate bill for the Women, Infants and Children program

3. $300 million for grants to combat violence against women

4. $2 billion for federal child care block grants

5. $6 billion for university building projects

6. $15 billion for boosting Pell Grant college scholarships

7. $4 billion for job-training programs, including $1.2 billion to provide “youth” summer jobs for people up to the age of 24

8. $1 billion for community development block grants

9. $4.2 billion for “neighborhood stabilization activities”

10. $650 million for digital TV coupons, including $90 million to educate “vulnerable populations”

POORLY DESIGNED TAX RELIEF:

11. $15 billion for business-loss carry-backs

12. $145 billion for “Making Work Pay” tax credits

13. $83 billion for the earned income credit

STIMULUS FOR THE GOVERNMENT:

14. $150 million for the Smithsonian

15. $34 million to renovate the Department of Commerce headquarters

16. $500 million for improvement projects for National Institutes of Health facilities

17. $44 million for repairs to Department of Agriculture headquarters

18. $350 million for Agriculture Department computers

19. $88 million to help move the Public Health Service into a new building next year

20. $448 million for constructing a new Homeland Security Department headquarters

21. $600 million to convert federal auto fleet to hybrids

22. $450 million for National Aeronautics and Space Administration

23. $600 million for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

24. $1 billion for the Census Bureau

INCOME TRANSFERS:

25. $89 billion for Medicaid

26. $30 billion for COBRA insurance extension

27. $36 billion for expanded unemployment benefits

28. $20 billion for food stamps

PURE PORK:

29. $4.5 billion for U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

30. $850 million for Amtrak

31. $87 million for a polar icebreaking ship

32. $1.7 billion for the National Park System

33. $55 million for Historic Preservation Fund

34. $7.6 billion for “rural community advancement programs”

35. $150 million for agricultural commodity purchases

36. $150 million for “producers of livestock, honeybees, and farm-raised fish”

RENEWABLE WASTE:

37. $2 billion for renewable energy research

38. $2 billion for a “clean-coal” power plant in Illinois

39. $6.2 billion shall be for the Weatherization Assistance Program

40. $3.5 billion shall be for energy efficiency and conservation block grants

41. $3.4 billion shall be for the State Energy Program

42. $200 million shall be for state and local electric-transport projects

43. $300 million shall be for energy-efficient appliance rebate programs

44. $400 million for hybrid cars for state and local governments

45. $1 billion for the manufacturing of advanced batteries

46. $1.5 billion for green technology loan guarantees

47. $8 billion for innovative technology loan guarantee program

48. $2.4 billion for carbon-capture demonstration projects

49. $4.5 billion for electricity grid

REWARDING STATE IRRESPONSIBILITY:

50. $79 billion for State Fiscal Stabilization Fund

Responsibility for the economic recession can be shared. And the Democrats are mostly responsible. The biggest cause of the recession is the mortgage crisis. And it was caused by Congress and mostly by Democrats. Barny Frank and Chris Dodd were the leaders of the "Community Reinvestment Act" that forced Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to make sub-prime loans to people who could not afford them. When the interest rates went up these people could no longer pay their mortgages and walked away. So the rest of us have to pay for them. Barney Frank said openly that he thinks that everyone has a right to own a home and what they did was morally right. He ought to be removed from Congress and thrown in jail.

To his credit President Bush asked Congress several times in the past 8 years to fix the problems. And Senator McCain actually twice proposed legislation to return to the 20% down rule and having to prove you can actually pay back the mortgage. The Dems in Congress did not listen.

Thanks for the posts HelenPR. At the end of the day the Administrations plan is a major piece of legislation that should be discussed during the budgetary process! NOT pushed through as absolutely necessary to save America!

IF The Plan is passed - there is no going back and we'll be saddled with a 8 or 9 billion dollar bill! We might be lucky if the plan has a marginal effect on the economy. Businesses not government will the ones that truly revive the economy!

Just a pet peeve for me.- 5. $6 billion for university building projects. I remember going to Wayne State University and paying an ever increasing tuition all the while watching the new buildings go up. I remember thinking to my self - the new buildings are nice but they don't help me learn any better and I'm still in debt! So how are the new buildings really helping the student!

Business and the corruption of Capitalism following hard on the fall of the other corruption Communism caused this mess. The US Government watching but doing nothing about worthless mortgages were sold all over the world. The world expects the US government to pull it's weight with other countries at getting it's economy under control. This is the worst mess since the Great Depression. If you dont know what that may mean for the USA and te rest fo the world, then get some old newspapers and DVD's of old film. It was a terrible time and the people suffered terribly. It's going to take more than spending to get the economy to turn around, it is going to take some major changes about how people go about their business. Corruption will need to be faced up to everywhere.

It may not completely fix the situation but it is a good start. One person's "pork" are other peoples jobs and health care. It may not be the best situation but without people working it's going to get alot worse (no jobs = no tax revenue = further cuts which excelorates the downward spiral). Let's pray for those who continue to loose their jobs at an alarming rate. I believe this mornings jobless numbers were the highest since 1974.

Stimulants that produce nothing is called "make work" or "pork". It does not stimulate the economy but drives it deeper toward depression. Funny money is still funny money. $500 of this new funny money may buy a loaf of bread but why is that an improvement?

CDL

Did you ever see the movie, "Soylent Green"?

I have a question. I have opened my local newspaper each AM and saw Gov Rell making large "cuts" to the state budget. How does slashing the budget (eliminating 23 state agencies and slashing construction spending) stimulate the economy? Those additional thousands of people who are now going to be unemployed will not spend, will take from unemployment and social services and will not be able to give back in the short term. It is only common sence that so called Pork is necessary spending to assist people during this troubled time. It's time to get off the failed "Right-Wing Soap Boxes" in this country and look at reality on the ground. (CDL this is not aimed at you exclusively but all those who pontificate about what is best for others as well.)



$500 for a loaf of bread??? The reality of the current situation is that there is not concern of inflation. Our biggest threat is the continuing de-flation...


Well that's my rant for the morning.
Job

Congress REQUIRED Fannie Mae and Freddie MAC and many banks to give mortgages to people who could not qualify to pay them. It created the problem. Congress TOLD the people buying these mortgages that they were good investments and would make money. Greed is involved here but the main cause of the problem is Congress. Capitalism is self-correcting over time.

Most government jobs are non-productive. That means we spend a lot of tax $ for people who do not produce anything. Using the recession to get rid of useless government agencies makes a lot of sense. If only President Obama would reduce the ranks of the federal government by half we could cut government spending and give that money back to the tax payers.

The stimulus bill won’t stimulate anything. Only $29 billion is slated to be spent in 2009. The other $800 billion is down the road a few years with the bulk of it going as reward to the various groups that supported Democrats in the last election.

What the President and Congress are doing is the equivalent of you digging yourself out of an economic hole by going on a spending spree that maxes out your credit cards. The result is always the same. You wind up in a bigger hole. Japan tried these spending bills 8 times in the 1990s and none of them worked. The United States tried it with the New Deal and it didn’t work. We tried it again in the 1960s and the 1970s and it didn’t work. We tried it again last spring with small cash payment to most Americans. It didn’t work. We tried it with a $150 billion stimulus bill in September. It didn’t work. Spending $800 billion over the next 4-6 years will not work.

All the spending bill does is to move money out of the hands of businesses and individuals (the people that create jobs) and give it to the government to spend on pork projects.

Here’s a really good article that explains this:
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Budget/bg2186.cfm

If a company would be faced with bureaucratic controls, including salary floors and caps, when they take federal money, why don't they just say no?

A number of banks tried to say no to the first bailout. The feds forced them to take the money. A lot of the smaller banks that did not make those risky loans are in solid shape and are not taking any bailout money. They all have money to lend.

They'd be better off not taking the money. If a business is run into the ground it deserves to be failed. It should not be allowed to become an eternal money pit for taxpayer dollars.

Did you hear President Obama last night? He said if Congress does not pass the pork spending bill right now that America will never recover from the recession. If you leave a recession alone the country will recover. It always happens. Capitalism is self-correcting.

I heard the fear mongering second-hand. The same line was used before the last spending bill was passed, and we're in no better shape. Socialism assures poverty, by keeping the downtrodden down or bringing those who rise above to level.

Yep. While we are going to be over populated we may wind up eating our children and our elderly.

CDL

To a point which we've exceeded greatly a government worker is necessary. But we are well beyond that point. Now the more people work for the government the poorer we become as a nation. Government workers by definition neither produce anything nor do they know how to produce anything. If they did they would not work for the government but would work for industry.

CDL

Dan,

Are your last two students really fair? I don't necessarily disagree with the assertion that our government has become too large and that we probably should look to eliminate some government jobs. However, your last comments seem a bit harsh. There are many people who have government jobs who provide needed services. Some of them actually are bright and talented people.

Ryan

Ryan,

You have presented a riddle I cannot penetrate. What do my students have to do with anything? Moreover, "service" is not "industry".

CDL

Dan,

I certainly agree with you that "service" is not "industry," and if your point was simply that government workers don't produce goods that can be sold, I have no disagreement with that. It's just that your assertion that if government workers only knew how to produce anything they would be in industry. To be perfectly honest, it seemed a bit insulting to me, but maybe I misinterpreted your comments.

Ryan

A friend in the financial industry asked me this morning what I thought about the economy, the stimulus, etc.

I'm no economist, so my opinion is like anyone else's. Opinions are like sweat socks. Everyone has two and most of them smell bad.

I don't see the whole world coming out of this in the next four years. Sorry to be a downer, but that's how I see it. It takes a long time to build wealth. It gets there by people doing what our grandparents and great-grandparents did: saving something each month and slowly building up the total. It's that simple. It also includes not touching it unless it's an absolute emergency. And an absolute emergency isn't college tuition or a new car or new clothing. It's something more, much more. In fact, when I used to talk to my own relatives about this, they simply stated that savings are what you lived on when you were too old to work. You didn't touch them until you were too old to work. In the meantime you scrimped and scratched to make a living and feed your family without touching savings. And if you absolutely had to do so, you took out as little as possible.

Wealth can only be built slowly. It can be lost quickly--just look at this past year. The world economy is still hemmorhaging jobs, wealth, and even hope for some people. Iceland is in default--a country, in default.

And the stimulus we intend to spend is going to be as big as the GDP of all but something like 16 countries?

If you've got a patch of back lawn, see if someone can help you put in a garden this spring. It may take some "victory gardens" to help ride this out.



Like it or not, the news was--about a year ago--that about half of the total work force in the U.S. worked for some level of government. With the private sector crashing I don't know what will happen with them: how many can be retained.

BOB

Job weakness: beyond layoffs [finance.yahoo.com]

It's clear that some are taking a knee jerk reaction...drastic times call for drastic measures...I agree that government is at times overblown...but in this economy is it prudent to cut those people when they are not likely to get a job in the near future??? That is cutting on one side of the balance sheet to take from the other side. Also in regards to my posting above...it's not only the CT government employees that are being effected...it's the construction workers on the infrastructure projects as well (which are not govt. employees) these private sector jobs will be more heavily effected than the govt employees...take a look at the above article the hiring freezes have created a situation where people are loosing their jobs and business isn't hiring...it's bad out here...and that's nowhere near Michigan, California or Rhode Island, who I believe all have unemployment rates over 10%

Service is an entirely different kettle of fish than is industry. It is a mistake to call Banking, education, of government anything than what they are. They are services not industries. Most of what both my wife and I have done our entire lives is service not industry. Industry builds cars, houses, appliances, etc. We have never done any of that. Service is important in that it supports industry but without industry service cannot develop an economy. Some services will always be needed even if there is not industry but what one has in an economy that is dominated by service is the Third World. Thus it has always been and thus it will always be.

What these bail outs do is pour money, tons of it, into the service sector where it is not needed and very little into industry where it is. That is a prescription for disaster and doubtless explains why only WWII pulled us out of the depression.

I too spoke with my banker who has a Master's Degree and working on a PhD in finance. She is very clear that this funny money being poured out from the Government will only limit the ability of our economy to recover. It is a terrible idea.

CDL

BTW Ryan, To whom did you refer when you spoke of my last two students?

Dan:

I meant to write "sentences," not "students." The only thing I can figure is that I typed the post from my computer at work (I am a teacher) and must have been thinking of my students.

Ryan

Ryan,

Thanks for the explanation. I've made many typos here and in my life. I certainly wouldn't criticize someone for that. I just thought I missed something.

CDL

I see many blame the peoples (what silly people) elected representaives in the Congress but no one says anything about the biggest spending Republican President in memory, who signed off on these bills. This all happened on his watch and he did nothing.

Amen!

It didn't all happen on his watch. But be that as it may, whining like this is the usual digression from the issue at hand. Printing funny money, effectively trying to borrow ones way out of debt, is stupid no matter who proposes it.

CDL

Bob-

I have to disagree... "The buck stops here!" - sign on the desk of President Harry S Truman.

Unfortunately, the 350 billion bucks that was supposed to flow into the economy stopped somewhere on the desks (or the wallets) of those executives who applied for the bail-out funds (AIG, BofA, etc). The Treasury under Bush is to blame for poor oversight.

I don't care who's to blame. If ideas were dynamite neither party has enough to blow up a paper bag. My fourth or fifth counsin depending upon how one figures it is Arther Laffer. Someone here probably knows that name. He was one of the primary figures on the economic team for Mr. Reagan. What we need is to pay attention to the lessons learned when that team stopped the insanity that now reigns in Washington.

CDL

I think Psalm 146:3 said it best, "Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help." I have no faith in either party anymore, and don't expect solutions from either of them.

CDL-

Dr Arthur Laffer was @ USC while I was there as an undergrad in the early years of the Reagan Revolution (I actually had a class with Dr Laffer's then girlfriend also an undergrad). During a August 28, 2006 broadcast on CNBC, Dr. Laffer rejected the notion that the US was headed for a recession in 2007/2008. He made on on-air wager with Peter Schiff who actually made the recession claim. (The wager was a penny and the honor of their respective reputations.) Dr Laffer has yet to pay.

Father Deacon,

Well you got me on that one. I'm sorry he lost. I've never met him but hope to this August at a family reunion. I'll ask him then if he has repaid the debt.

CDL

Father Deacon John:

While I liked Truman's desk plate, I also have to say that one man--the president--is up against 535 people in another branch of government who have a knack for fouling things up and then trying to avoid blame for their actions by dissing the president. I'd blame a president if he were the dictator and there were no 535 legislators, but can't lay all the blame on one man for this current debacle.

The Treasury is certainly to blame. And everyone who scrambled--yes, scrambled--to DO SOMETHING is to blame. when did you ever hear of anyone giving away that kind of money with no strings? It was insane. And the further pretending to DO SOMETHING more is equally insane. The private sector is swirling down the drain and that is the only place where jobs and wealth can be created to stimulate any economy. But the new taxes needed to sustain the stimulus have to come from crushing further the private sector.

I do have a solution, but it's not Christian so I won't post the full details. Basically it involves the people hanging politicians as a naitonal sport--something like an afternoon at a baseball game.

BOB

I find this interesting...

The problem in the proposed stimulus bill comes from a provision that states: "PROHIBITED USES OF FUNDS. - No funds awarded under this section may be used for - (C) modernization, renovation
, or repair of facilities - (i) used for sectarian instruction, religious worship, or a school or department of divinity; or (ii) in which a substantial portion of the functions of the facilities are subsumed in a religious mission."

The wording that specifically targets religious speech already has been approved by the majority Democrats in the U.S. House – all GOP members opposed it. In the Senate, Jim DeMint, R-S.C., proposed an amendment to eliminate it, but again majority Democrats decided to keep the provision targeting religious instruction and activities...

Critics argued schools would accept any money offered, then impose a ban on religious events.

DeMint warned organizations such as the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Campus Crusade for Christ, Catholic Student Ministries, Hillel and other religious groups would face new bans on access to public facilities that would not apply to other organizations.

"This is a direct attack on students of faith, and I'm outraged Democrats are using an economic stimulus bill to promote discrimination," DeMint said. "Democrats should be ashamed of themselves for siding with the ACLU over millions of students of faith."

"These students simply want equal access to public facilities, which is their constitutional right. This hostility toward religion must end. Those who voted to for this discrimination are standing in the schoolhouse door to deny people of faith from entering any campus building renovated by this bill," said DeMint.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=88178

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