Friday, February 6, 2009

A NEW PRESIDENT, A NEW IMMINENT THREAT, A NEW POLITICAL FOOTBALL.

Barack Obama has said that the the stimulus package must be passed by Feb. 16. Why Feb 16th he has never specifically said. What he has said is that the bill must be passed and passed now because if it isnt, the country faces an economic disaster from which the country may well never recover. According to Obama we face this impending disaster now and so action must be taken now, by Feb.16th.

The last time a President told the country we faced an imminent threat of disaster and that action had to be taken now, and then successfully pushed the Senate into taking that action because a threat was imminent, we ended up invading Iraq. The more Obama talks, the more one listens to the debate, the more you hear him being assertive one day, then backtracking the next, then sounding conciliatory, then fear mongering, the stimulus bill is starting to sound more and more like Obama's and the Democrats Iraq.

If time is of the essence with respect to passing this bill, then the bill Nancy Pelosi pushed through the House under her "leadership" was a waste of that time. A stimulus bill designed to create jobs, save homeowners from foreclosure,and free up the credit markets had no business having provisions for birth control and family planning, money for the National Endowment for the Arts,and a variety of other projects, many of which are worthy and deserve being funded but had no place in the stimulus bill.

The arrogance and stupidity of Pelosi to think, if she did, that she could stuff this bill with provisions on spending that should be voted on separately in separate appropriations bills and get away with it, is extraordinary. And if time does become a factor, the blame rests squarely on Pelosi, not the objections of most Republicans and some Democrats to things that don't belong in the bill and seem not to do enough where the most help is needed.

But not only did Pelosi wrongly think that Republicans would just roll over and go along with anything that was in the bill, she wrongly misjudged many Democrats who also support some of those added on provisions but who rightly believe they don't belong in the economic stimulus bill.

What Pelosi did with the current bill is waste people's time since most of the debate in the Senate over getting rid of those provisions could have been spent on other aspects of the bill.

It was also politically stupid to put those non stimulus provisions in the bill, because it has turned the majority of Americans against it as it stands now and further undermined Obama's credibility which is shrinking so fast Bed Bath and Beyond is now offering the Obama "Historic Moment" commemorative plate at 50% off (I'm not kidding). And he's only been in office 2 weeks. The value of that plate has detriorated faster than Citi Group stock and at about the same percentage.

Obama is insisting this massive bill has to be passed by the 16th allowing for only 5 days of conference once the Senate version passes when, as one journalist pointed out, bills involving one tenth of this amount of money have been in conference, at times up to a year, but more routinely weeks or even months. Obama's most recent assertions that the bill has to be passed now to avert an impending disaster sounds more and more like Bush's fear mongering on Iraq's impending nuclear threat and how if we waited for the weapons inspectors to find a smoking gun, the smoking gun could be in the form of a mushroom cloud (everyone remember that one?)
It seems that Obama is now trying to get his stimulus package through the Senate by trying to use the same tactics. He still has not said why this bill has to be signed into law by the 16th.

During the Presidential campaign I created a commercial which pointed out that Obama had spent more than $3 million just so he could give his acceptance speech in the Denver Bronco's football stadium instead of the Pepsi Center. And he did it at a time when the severity of the economic crisis was becoming apparent and people were losing their homes. The commercial asked if someone who would waste $3 million on giving a speech in a football stadium just as the country was slipping into a severe economic crisis could have the judgment to handle such a crisis as President or whether he would simply turn it into a political football.

Based on the same kind of "imminent threat" fear mongering we heard from Bush on Iraq being used by Obama to get a bill passed that most people think needs more time and work, it looks like football season isn't over but may just be beginning.

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

Marc- OMG!! You are so right- I was noticing that last night- listening to Obama (for the 8 minutes I was able to tolerate im)- he is using the EXACT same fear tactics that Bush did in getting us into Iraq.
Thank you for your timely post.
Please everyone- please contact your senators and urge them to vote against the stimulus as it currently stands

Pamela of the Poconos said...

Do you think there is right now someone on a corner in Springfield Illinois saying "I was against the stimulus legislation from the beginning ... I'm the one who had the good judgment to know it was a bad idea" ... ?

Anonymous said...

I agree with you Tom. But what do you think about the stimulus plan itself? Do you think it will help at all? Obama is the third Bush term and he has shown that he will stop at nothing to save his political career. He did horrible things during the election and I don't expect him to stop using those same tactics to get what he wants while in office or in the 2012 election. The press calls it intelligence and political savvy. I call it outright corruption.

Marc Rubin said...

"I agree with you Tom. But what do you think about the stimulus plan itself?"

As someone who has leaned Democratic my whole life its embarrassing to see that the ideas that make the most sense are coming from Republicans. Doubling the tax credit for home buyers to $15,000 from $7500 makes sense. Transferring $22 billion to renegotiate the mortages of people about to lose their home and keep 1.5 million people who would otherwise lose their homes IN their homes make sense. Im completely for money for education but putting that in the stimulus bill was stupid. The same for family planning, the NEA, and a host of other worthy programs that should be voted on separately since they have nothing to do with stimulating the economy. Something has to be done, and some kind of stimulus bill is needed but this Pelosi/Obama boondoggle got off on the wrong foot and I don't believe for one secod that it has to be on Obama's desk by Feb 16 or the country will go to hell. Thats Bushspeak.The knock against the infrastructure spending is only that it won't be spent right away. If it does get spent right away that can help but the candidate who claimed to be ready to be President from Day One, looks like a rank amatuer.

Anonymous said...

gr8 piece M - posted!

a whopping 2 republican senators on board tonight - it's going to be a very long 8 years ...

princess wears prada

Anonymous said...

I was in Bed Bath & Beyond the other day and I saw the one's plates reduced 50% ! But then his followers do have a very short attention span.Hilarious except what he is up to not so much and unbelievably predictable.People just wouldn't entertain the possibility that he was not ready to lead this country.

Anonymous said...

Great piece, as usual. I agree on on one level that there's stuff in the package not directly related to a "stimulus package," but....it's a bit of a slippery slope. One could argue that money for family planning is relevent as it can help to reduce unwanted pregnancies many of which would result in pulling on government dollars. I'm also concerned that in Obama and the Dem's efforts to start to shed aspects of the package that are not directly relevant, he/they seem ready and willing to first ditch programs that would benefit some of the most vulnerable in the population: poor women, children, individuals with disabilities. This speaks volumes about Obama.

Folks, we've got a child in the White House and it'll be a long four years, at best. I fear, the at worst scenarios of which I can imagine many.

Anna

Logistics Monster said...

Amen to all that! ...and I do not think we are going to have to tolerate him for four years...his administration is collapsing from the inside and it hasn't really started yet.

Hele On Folks!!

Hillarysmygirl08 said...

What does anyone really expect from the baby in the White House. He stomps his feet when he doesn't get what he wants. He reminds me of GWB and I pointed that out to people but everyone was so worried about the R after McCain's name that we got Dumbo in there again.

Anonymous said...

Three unrelated points:

1. What President says things like "I screwed up." Slang. Talks like a teenager. Pitiful.

2. I see on Yahoo news today Obama has commented that Air Force One is "pretty nice." Again, is this an elementary school student on a field trip to the Fire Station? Hello? How about a serious statement on national security?

3. O gets mad at the press (who are still pretty much fawning all over him) at the slightest whiff of disapproval. Again, so pitiful. So childlike. So insecure.

THIS is our President, people!

Never in my life (and I'm a well into middle aged adult) have I gone to sleep and awakened feeling scared and sick to my stomach when I think of who is steering the ship. No joke. We are in deep trouble.

Marc, keep 'em coming! Gotta save my sanity while trying to also save my money and also my life these crazy crazy days in America.

Anna

Anonymous said...

Oompaa Loompaa doopedy-doo.
What do you get when you let others do your work?
People calling their reps and saying you are a spend-thrift jerk!
Oompaa Loompaa doopedy-doo.
Why do the work when others' work will do?
Stomp your feet, act like you are two...
Oompaa Loompaa doopedy-doo.
Read the pork package - stimulus NOT!
Thunked up by a Bot.
...

Anonymous said...

Another question comes to mind this morning, as I am watching Obama prepare for his next road trip.

Why are we spending tax payer money to put on this dog and pony show of Obama's? I for one am tired of his theatrics, which seem to be the only thing at which he is effective.

This stimulus package is a watered down-pork filled joke. But it seems OK w/ this administration to spend the kind of money it takes to put on this road trip, to essentially beg all of his adorers to support the stimulus.

I really think they are reaching.

Anonymous said...

I really thought the Dems once in power would be less transparent about wielding power from typically liberal positions. Sadly, Pelosi, Reid and their puppet Obama are behaving as predicted a long time ago. The fact that Obama had no hand in writing the stimulus bill told me everything about how his term will likely play out. We just voted in left-wing idealogues who have no intention of governing from the middle - which only means we will not see pragmatic policy-making. This bill is a travesty! Anyone interested can go to nostimulus.com to register their opposition.
90% of this bill does NOTHING to get at the root of the problem and that remains the credit/housing crisis.
If I resisted Bush's fear-mongering over the war, I can resist this.

Anonymous said...

Meant to add: I think he wants this bill passed by Feb. 16th to coincide with President's Day. More Axelrod "narrative" propaganda. As long as they get to keep marketing Obama as Lincoln, they're happy. They'll use anything - including bankrupting the country - to continue this sham.

Anonymous said...

Please go to hillbuzz.wordpress.com. There is an article dated 2/9/09 entitled "The United States of Blagojevich". It relates to a clip from Michael Savage (not sure who he is) but they figured out that this bailout is not so much about the recession as it is to help Chicago pay for the Olympics and build the Obama Library and Museum, as well as give billions to ACORN to make sure Obama is re-elected in 2012. This is corruption at its highest and nth degree. As a Chicago resident, I heard Mayor Daley on the news over the weekend reiterating the fact that the taxpayers of Chicago will NOT be funding the 2016 Olympics, but the money will come from the federal government. Now I know what he means! Pat Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor, recently said Blago brought corruption to a new low. Well, Obama and Co. brought corruption to an even lower low. Mr. Obama may be a "rank amateur" when it comes to finance and actually helping the economy, but when it comes to dirty politics, and knowing how to scam the system, Obama (with the help of Daley and the Illinois corruption machine) is at the top of his game.