Durbin smacks down Vitter on ACORN nonsense

1 comment February 7th, 2009

Republican Sen. David Vitter, the infamous patron of prostitutes, gets a little what-for from Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin on the subject of ACORN:

The dumbest thing in this stimulus debate is the notion that federal spending doesn’t create jobs

17 comments February 7th, 2009

 

Would one of you conservatives please explain the theory that the legislation proposed by President Obama is a spending bill, not a stimulus bill?

No, not you, John McCain. We don’t need any explanations from a guy who repeatedly contended last year, even after the financial system began to collapse, that “the fundamentals of our economy are strong.”

And no, we don’t need explanations from any boneheads who contend that the New Deal did nothing to improve the economy and that it was only World War II that ended the Great Depression.  (Ask yourselves: How did the war end the Depression? Answer: By creating jobs through massive federal spending.)

I want an explanation from somebody other than McCain and somebody other than the New Deal revisionists.  I want an explanation of the theory that the spending in the Obama bill won’t create jobs.

I’d also like an explanation of why the mainstream media are doing such a HORRIBLE JOB of covering the debate over the stimulus bill.

UPDATE: I like THIS COLUMN by Steven Pearlstein, who mockingly suggests that the stimulus bill should include money to promote economic literacy.

Pearlstein also says this of Republican critics of the bill:

“Actually, what’s striking is that supposedly intelligent people are horrified at the thought that, during a deep recession, government might try to help the economy by buying up-to-date equipment for the people who protect us from epidemics and infectious diseases, by hiring people to repair environmental damage on federal lands and by contracting with private companies to make federal buildings more energy-efficient.

“What really irks so many Republicans, of course, is that all the stimulus money isn’t being used to cut individual and business taxes, their cure-all for economic ailments, even though all the credible evidence is that tax cuts are only about half as stimulative as direct government spending.”

Got that? Tax cuts are only half as stimulative as government spending. Too bad John McCain and the gang who ran our economy into the ditch don’t know that. History is not going to be kind to those folks.

A “non-economist” examines stimulus debate

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Newsweek’s Michael Hirsh SAYS America is on the verge of “a giant historical experiment.”

Rachel Maddow lectures the dimwits on stimulus

5 comments February 7th, 2009

President Obama’s weekly YouTube address

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Is this guy whistling past the graveyard?

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David Frum (above)  makes an INTERESTING ARGUMENT that conservativism is not dead but merely resting.

Lefties and righties alike, or at least the serious ones, should read this thing and also the stuff to which Frum links. Both sides will find that there’s plenty of material here with which to agree or disagree.