The New York Times has the story:
The House approved a $787 billion economic stimulus package Friday afternoon, with Democrats successfully promoting it as a boost for middle-class Americans and Republicans countering in vain that it will only stimulate wasteful government spending.As CNN reports, "the written version of the legislation wasn't available for lawmakers to view until around 11 p.m. Thursday." Indeed, as Nina Easton points out, the Democrats don't want debate and deliberation, they want speed:
The vote was 246 to 183, reflecting the Democrats’ considerable majority in the House and the Republicans’ deep dissatisfaction with the measure, whose estimated price tag has fluctuated daily and was finally placed at $787 billion on Friday. Not a single Republican voted in favor of the bill ....
"After all the debate, this legislation can be summed up in one word: Jobs," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California said. "The American people need action and they need action now."
But Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, the House minority leader, lamented that a bill that was supposed to be about “jobs, jobs, jobs” had turned into one that was about “spending, spending, spending.”
“We owe it to the people to get this bill right,” Mr. Boehner said.
There is a breadth and breathlessness to these under-takings, a frenzy of policymaking that will shape the contours of America's economic future. Top Obama advisors who talked (often as they walked) with Fortune in early February put a premium on speed - speed to catch the right moment to turn around a deepening recession, speed to take advantage of this moment of crisis to put in place a Democratic vision of government's role, speed to pass major legislation while the President is riding high in the polls.
5 comments:
We're screwed.
For now at least, Raul.
David Brooks has a "worst-case scenario" up in his Op-Ed in today's NYT. The mixtum-gatherum of scams and pork projects the Democrats have filled as though they were their own Santa putting the presents under their own tree is not likely to work, implies the Brooks scenario.
And after the smash-and-grab heist, the Dems are now preparing to perpetuate their RICO unconstitutional coup de pouce through a "Fairness Act" by a less oxymoronic name and grabbing the Census from Commerce to put into manic [my daughter's babysitter also babysat Rahm twenty-five years earlier in Winnetka!] Emmanuel's meat paws where the Dems will gerrymander Repubs out of a chance to realign in '10.
Thank God Gregg showed that, unlike the two shrews from Maine and serial opportunist hair-plugger Spector, there is some moral fiber somewhere in the GOP.
Let's see if the upcoming unconstitutional violation of the First Amendment can be foisted on a people rapidly losing any opportunity to react to a criminal conspiracy!
Thanks for checking in, Dave! I'll check out the Brooks link.
That was an excellent speech. The Republicans being excluded from this bill mean that 46% of Americans - that they represent in the Presidential election - were excluded from this bill. Since this bill was rejected by all the Republicans - that means, to me, that this bill was strongly disapproved of in what it truly represents by 46% of Americans. I'm not sure what the polls say - because Americans did want the government to take action. But at least, it would seem to me, 46% of Americans did not want what was in this bill.
Now how can Democrats controlling the federal government expect to maintain a unified nation when they do not craft legislation that accurately truly reflects a unified populace?? They cannot. They are passing extreme legislation that is so leftist, rather than centrist, which is creating further divide in this nation. Obama ran as a centrist. Many of us knew that no matter what he said in his campaign, he would go hard left in office. He's done just that. And he's creating division and polarization in this nation more powerfully than any leader in American history - because this bill is the most government growing, hard left, expansive and sweeping borrowing and spending program in American history. And he did that when we cannot afford more government growth - and when we need to stimulate job growth by tax reduction on business. He ran as one thing (centrist) and is functioning as another (hard left).
That's going to come back to haunt him, imo.
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