My eldest son wrote this last night...I am so proud that I could weep. I think there is enough to read for the Whited.
A response to ignorant lies from radical loons
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Today at 3:19am
For this to make sense, you'll have to read this first:
First, that summary is a proposal, and is not representative of the actual bill that was passed. Second, the President has imposed limits on CEO salaries, so that the type of corruption we've seen in the past will be much more difficult to pull off. Third, true supply-side economics are nothing like what Bush actually enacted, and he is ultimately responsible for bankrupting America. You can’t cut tax revenue and spend 1 trillion in a war without some kind of plan to recoup the losses. And Bush still stayed the course with a flawed economic theory. I suggest that supporters of Bush’s tax cuts read this: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/06/opinion/06bartlett.html?_r=1 and realize that Bush has always been for big business and big oil. If you can’t accept that, go back to your cave and leave me alone. His family made its fortune in oil, and he had a cocaine habit in college. For the record, cocaine’s expensive. To be fair, Bush Sr.’s tax increases that cost him reelection were a primary factor in Clinton’s ability to balance the budget. Now, I wish Nancy Pelosi would keep her freakin' mouth shut, (although much of what she’s saying at least comes from the people responsible for keeping track of the statistics) and I wish that the right-wingers like Bill O'Reilly (sorry about the spelling) would stop fabricating sensationalist press to sell to the gullible masses. Has anyone here ever heard of confirmation bias? It is the phenomenon in which a person chooses to listen to and assimilate only the information that is in line with what that person already believes, ignoring everything else. It’s well documented, and appears even in introductory psychology texts. (Perhaps there is a reason that the most highly educated tend not to be so stubbornly conservative as to take us back to the dark ages? I say this, not to support any sense of elitism among the educated, because that is wrong, but merely to suggest to EVERYONE that they should admit that there are things they know little or nothing about, and that parroting a talk-show host’s lines make you sound ignorant, at best.) I suggest you go look at the actual bill and stop believing the lies you're hearing on your talk radio and editorial shows. They are not news shows and they aren’t bound by the confines of journalistic integrity. (The only reason O'Riley hasn't been made a fool of on his own show on several occasions is because he shouts everyone down who has something intelligent to say. He's a fool, as is anyone who believes any of the political analysis that comes out of FOX or any other commercialized broadcast. He ought to win a Pulitzer Prize, because he and Pulitzer are/were in the same business: Yellow Journalism. The bottom line is, get your facts from the primary source (e.g., the document itself) http://www.democracyfornewhampshire.com/node/view/6444 or admit that you're too ignorant of the facts to come to an educated conclusion.) I don’t really understand how you can equate any of the measures in the bill to paying off special interests or unions or funding ‘pork-barrel’ projects, especially seeing as how Obama was very clear about where his money was coming from and what he would and would not accept. It sounds to me like you’re parroting Limbaugh or O Riley, whose presentation of the facts is incomplete at the best of times and downright falsified at the worst.
In response some of the other comments made both in the article and in the comments:
Government spending can (and does) create jobs. The question should be how much government spending is sustainable and how we need to restructure the economy to meet the needs of the people. The Republican administration's spending on the war created jobs for soldiers, and at the very least preserved the jobs of many hardworking people at Lockheed and similar defense corporations. The so-called 'war on drugs' and the government funding associated with it created jobs for DEA agents and other law enforcement. What Obama is trying to do is create some new job markets and stimulate some old ones. By making energy independence a national goal, and providing capital to jumpstart the industry, jobs will be created in renewable energy and related industries. By making it a priority to rebuild the infrastructure of our nation, and providing funding to do so, he's looking to put the unemployed to work improving our transportation systems and our public places. You don't see him subsidizing coal mines... although that might create some jobs as well. The plan is to look to the future, and position ourselves to be an efficient and competitive marketplace in the global economy over the next 50 years.
Bank of America is evil... the people responsible for wasting that money on a party should be sentenced to federal prison for 20 or 30 years. I think everyone can agree on that point. As a moderate democrat, I'd be happy to see some of the huge corporations crumble and see a plethora of small, independent organizations spring up to take their place, much like the undergrowth in a forest when a huge rotten old tree falls and lets some sunlight in. But that's beside the point. The point is, had the money been spent according to the intentions in which it was given, it would have done some good. How much good? Who knows? But if you're going criticize the government, criticize both the D's and the R's for failing to put rigid limits on how that money should be used. That was shortsighted. On the bright side, however, it appears that this President learned from that mistake and limited executive salaries in companies receiving government assistance.
In response to the comments about education: The reasons all of that money isn't going directly to the students are numerous, and probably beyond our understanding of the issues without further study. I can think of a few, however. Can you think of any group of people more capable of mishandling money than 18-22 year olds? Second, problems in higher education aren't limited to access. I think you will agree that our primary and secondary schools could use a shot in the arm, of sorts. Our teachers deserve to be well paid. Also under the heading "Education" is the job training for dislocated workers, and for emerging industries, including renewable energy, which is crucial to the administration's goal. (As an aside, I don't think I've heard anyone disagree with the President's goals... they just seem to want to get angry about something, and will use almost any excuse to do so.)
In response to the Lyman stimulus package:
It seems that you don't really have an understanding of these topics, as what you propose is essentially Keynesian economic theory. You’re advocating creating a demand for goods by giving people a temporary means to purchase them, through tax cuts, not in the marginal rate, but overall, decreasing revenue. This plan takes the worst parts of Keynesian and a terrible simplification of ‘supply-side’ economics and combines them into a terribly appealing, to the unlettered in such things, poisoned apple. What we've seen in the past is that an extra 600 or 6000 dollars will not have a lasting effect on the economy. The reason for this is that this solution does not address the problems at the root of our economic crisis, only the symptoms, and is at best a band-aid to mask the wound temporarily. It failed when Bush tried it, and you're only modification to his plan is to expand it to such a proportion that it would cripple the national government. Now I foresee that you're going to argue that since Obama's plan is spending the same amount of money, and will therefore have the same result, I will put forth this illustration: A family has 100,000 dollars in a year to allocate in whatever manner. This family is living in a house with a bad roof, serious foundation problems, and termites. They own 2 vehicles, badly in need of some basic maintenance to keep them running. (Oil change, new tires, shocks, brakes, radiator fluid, spark plugs and wires, distributor cap, etc.) We'll assume that they're paying 2,000 a month for their mortgage, another 700 for utilities, 300 for fuel, 400 for groceries, 200 for their cable TV and internet. That comes to 43,200 a year. The repairs and maintenance to their vehicles are going to cost about 500 each. Cool. The home repairs, however are much more expensive. The entire roof needs to be replaced, and other damage to the structure and interior of the house is extensive, and is going to cost 55,800, or the rest of their available funds, to complete, but if they do so, they'll have 2 rooms in their home available to rent at $600 a month each. Even so, they won't be able to afford to have the drywall in the interior repaired. Here's the nitty gritty: Your plan for this family ends with them ignoring their vehicular maintenance and home repair needs, and they spend 55,000 on a new porsche, whose maintenance costs are going to increase exponentially after 30,000 miles, leaving them living in a leaky, crumbling home, and 800 bucks left over to buy an LCD HDTV at Wal-Mart. Obama's plan for this family leaves them with serviceable, if not luxury, vehicles, and a sound home that is providing them with a little bit of extra income that helps to pay the mortgage and leaves a little bit more left over each year that they are able to contribute to their retirement plans, and through the magic of compounding interest, the 800 dollars a month they contribute, or about 10,000 a year, allows them to retire as millionaires in 40 years, because they started investing early.
In conclusion, your solution is short-sighted, at best. and I don't know how Waiter is blaming the democrats for people's poor judgement in spending Bush's little stimulus package thingy. And that financial bail-out was meant to preserve jobs and pensions and 401k's, not necessarily to create new jobs. A penny saved is a penny earned, as they say. It's your stubborn, mule-like resistance to the assimilation of knowledge and new ideas that is going to cripple you in the long run. Just as a little factoid, 80% of the national debt has been accrued under just 3 republican administrations. Where is that mythical fiscal responsibility we've heard about? I guess it went the way of the unicorn. Who screwed the working man but the administrations who support big business interests and do little to encourage free enterprise while lining their pockets? The President isn't asking waiters to share their tips, he's asking the wealthiest among us to shoulder (finally) their share of the tax burden and give us working college-educated stiffs a break. For that, you should be grateful.
Also, national economics is not common sense, but is very complex, as anyone with any advanced knowledge in the area can tell you. It seems to me that this President has a more clear sense of history than any we've had in my admittedly short lifetime. He's looking back to FDR's example, and while his programs may not have been popular, and I'm sure not for throwing cash away to people who are capable of working, they worked.
In a final conclusion, I have yet to hear any cogent arguments against the President or his policies. That is not to say that they don't exist. Obama won both the popular and electoral vote, which is more than anyone can say about Bush in his second term. The 18% of Americans who supported him at his lowest are apparently the most vocal activists in the nation, but are after all, a small minority. I, for one, am ashamed that political discussion in this country has degenerated into such an ugly slanging match. It seems to me that the extremists, both reactionary and revolutionary, only solidify and erect barriers to keep out reality. The reality is that we need practical solutions to overwhelming problems with our nation, and it seems to me that many extreme conservatives are more concerned about political posturing, lamenting their fall from power and devising convoluted schemes to discredit their opposition, than they are with the well-being of this nation. I am all for discussion and argumentation of issues, but fabricated stories are not issues. Personal disagreements are not issues. And as a member of a younger, optimistic, and thoroughly pissed-off generation, part of me wonders if all of these old barking dogs just can't deal with the reality of a black man being president, and are inventing all these schemes to hide a pervasive underlying racism. I hope and pray that this is not the case, but this is a possibility that I have been forced to consider in light of all of the people that I have spoken to that have admitted that they didn't want a black man as president. In retrospect, I have much more respect for those who are honest about those feelings than those cowards who won't even acknowledge them (the feelings of racism), even though I refuse to condone racism in any form.
Please send this to whoever you think will at least listen and consider....and those who won't too. Angry people are easier to take advantage of. ;)
