stimulus package

by  Lance Thompson

My switch from analog to digital photography occurred last summer, and my new computer came with Photoshop, so all this instant photo retouching is a revelation.  Now, instead of waiting for photo processing, the results are immediate.  Retouching can be done in the camera.  Manipulation of the photos is a breeze on the computer.  I can combine elements, erase them, even draw and annotate.  The power is intoxicating.  Reality is mine to shape and distort as I choose. 

Of course, with absolute power comes the temptation to go too far.  Not content with removing red-eye or simplifying distracting backgrounds or improving lighting, my tampering crossed the line of good judgment.  I intensified colors to neon brightness, multiplied waterfalls with reckless abandon, dramatized historical photos with modern special effects.  It was a disaster.

But the makers of Photoshop, in their wisdom, included an insurance policy.  It is a function called “Undo,” and it allows the user to erase all the ill-advised modifications he has made when his good sense catches up with him. 

Similarly, the president’s first legislative initiatives, the stimulus and spending bills, which send the national debt to Marianas Trench-like depths, afforded Democrats the same kind of sudden unlimited power.  The president was selling crisis to the public, Pelosi and Reid weren’t letting anyone read the bills, and there was an opportunity for every Democrat to have his legislative wishes granted.  Cost was not a factor–rub Obama’s magic lamp and your fondest earmark will become reality.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the stimulus and the omnibus spending bills had “Undo” buttons?  A hundred million to ACORN, the organization that creates votes out of thin air and will soon be helping to tabulate the Census.  UNDO.  Insuring honey bees and farm raised fish for another $150 million.  UNDO.  $850 million to bail out Amtrak.  UNDO.   Nine thousand earmarks from Democrats and Republicans. UNDO.

As the nation plunges into record-breaking debt, with the only response from the White House and Congress being to spend more, Americans are beginning to see the onrushing train at the end of the tunnel.  Obama’s own nominee for commerce secretary, New Hampshire Senator Judd Gregg, compared Obama’s economic plan to that of a banana republic, and called the level of debt that will result “unsustainable.”  Many Americans who supported and voted for Obama may be wishing there was an UNDO button on their ballots.

In fact, there is.  There’s an UNDO function coming in Election 2.010.  The UNDO button won’t apply to Obama–he’s not due for an update until 2012.  But every member of the House and one third of the Senate will be up for re-election in 2010.  It’s not as easy as voting Republican instead of Democrat.  Several courageous Democrats in the House voted against the stimulus bill, and three imbecile Republicans in the Senate voted for it.  So you’ll all have to do your own research.

If the Senator or congressman who represents you voted for trillions of dollars in spending, and is sending you the bill, your choice is clear.  UNDO to others as they have tried to UNDO our economy.  It’s as simple as the push of a button.

by Lance Thompson

As the stimulus bill staggers through committee, its egregious profligacy more obvious with each passing hour, President Obama remains its steadfast defender. If Obama had made no other decisions during his first three weeks as president, this suicidal spending package would be enough to reveal his incompetence. But he did not stop there.

After his Air Force One joy ride to the Democrat conference in Williamsburg, Obama whined to sympathetic pols that he’d inherited a massive debt by the previous administration, “wrapped in a big bow and waiting for me.” Yet Obama’s response to this burden is to quadruple that debt and leave that much more insidious legacy to the next few presidents. Obama came to office saddled with a heavy credit card balance. His answer is not only to ask Congress for a drastically higher credit limit but also allow them to spend every dime of it immediately.

The President has focused a great deal of energy and political capital on a bill that he had little or no hand in shaping. In fact, this bill, consisting of 647 plus pages before amendments, could not possibly have been written in the short time Obama has been in office. This stimulus bill, purportedly the last best hope of our nation for fiscal health, is not the work of economists grappling with a financial crisis. That would have taken weeks or months. No, this massive piece of legislation could only have been compiled so quickly by the cut and paste magic of word processing. Every liberal chestnut on the Democrat wish list was double-clicked into this “emergency” stimulus bill, under the supervision of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. This was their chance to get it all in one go, with the nation evidently willing to try anything, and the newly-elected president content to cheerlead from the White House.

But the stimulus bill is not Obama’s only foray into executive action. He also has made many presidential appointments to cabinet and other positions. Judging from the unsavory nature of many of his picks–Daschle, Geithner, Richardson, Killefer, Holder, Lynn--this seems to be Obama’s jobs program for at-risk Democrats. He lures them away from lives of tax evasion and influence peddling with character-building jobs in the new administration. Some, like Ricahrdson, Daschle and Killefer, withdrew in the face of mounting outrage over their above-the-law behavior, went back to their day jobs, which suggests a high recidivism rate for this particular effort.

Not content to cripple the American economy, Obama has also been active in foreign policy. In an al-Arabiyah interview, he apologized for America’s tendency to “dictate” to the people of the Middle East. He doesn’t seem to understand that freedom, of the kind our military provided for the people of Iraq, is a precious gift. It is the oppression Iraqis and Kuwaitis suffered under Saddam Hussein that had to be dictated and brutally enforced. Obama’s statements were a slur on every American serving in uniform and especially upon those who fought for the freedom of Muslims in the Balkans, in the first Gulf War, in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Obama’s backpedaling on placing American missile defense systems in Eastern Europe has already emboldened Russian president Mevedev and puppetmaster Putin to threaten the fragile freedom of the former Soviet republics still living in the shadow of the Russian bear. Under Russian pressure, the independent state of Kyrgyzstan closed its Manas air base to US supply flights to Afghanistan. The Kremlin has also announced it will aid the Iranian terrorist-sponsoring regime of Mahmoud Achmadinejad to bolster its nuclear program, which Achmadinejad has vowed to pursue at all costs.

The president recently vowed to unilaterally keep space free of American weaponry. He must believe that the accelerated space programs of Russia, Red China, North Korea and now Iran are all being undertaken for humanitarian purposes. Our nation has many implacable enemies. They have already taken the measure of our president and found in his equivocal manner an opportunity to advance their antagonistic designs.

On the home front, neither Barack Obama nor his exceedingly inarticulate spokesman, Robert Gibbs, likes to answer substantive questions. Obama treats any press inquiry about a matter of policy as a breach of manners, and is likely to scold the reporter. I am more forgiving of Gibbs. If I had to explain the mind-numbing incompetency of Obama policy, I would perspire, stammer and obfuscate as well.

Obama’s first three weeks in office have antagonized and united domestic opponents, confused and frustrated Democrat allies, and left foreign leaders–both friendly and otherwise–unimpressed. What we needed at this moment of crisis was a leader with courage, experience and resolve. What we got was a paper-hatted trainee who each day gives us a new reason to hope for change.

http://www.lowdowncentral.com/feature-article/2009/2/9/stimulating-times.html

 Sister Toldjah has an idea:  Why not stand up for some traditional conservative values, you know, like they mean something.

Republicans have known for several months that they'd be facing Barack Obama as president and a Democratic majority in Congress.  But knowing their opponent hasn't translated into a strategy for dealing with Mr. Obama's enormous - and, in all probability, temporary - popularity.

I understand that taking a fiscally responsible stance will be tough after the Bush years' budgetary irresponsibility.  But I would suggest that Republicans need to play a quick game of pin-the-tail-on-the-designated-scapegoat and get back Phil Gramm-style defending of the federal budget ASAP.

That means before the Democrats' bloated stimulus package, which Michelle Malkin correctly identifies as the Generational Theft Act, is rammed through Congress.  Currently weighing in at a corpulent $1.1T, this one bill would add an estimated 9% onto a massive national debt that is already beyond our ability to pay back while levying any sort of reasonable tax rate on American workers.

Whilst trying to figure out who they are, Republicans would do well to consider that the U.S. debt problem became geometrically worse under the Reagan and Bush administrations.  This is not just a Democratic problem; however, only Republicans have the history and the constituency to make fiscal restraint in Washington a possibility, however remote.

Perhaps the most unpleasant part of the message that needs to be put forth is that the current generation of Americans must reduce their expectations of what the government is going to be able to do for them financially.  It's both craven and irresponsible for Baby Boomers to consume the economic resources of this country to the extent that today's children will toil their entire lives under the weight of the Boomers' self-indulgence.

Americans have sent a clear message that must be reflected upon: As Republicans, we are not trusted to lead this country. After the results from eight years of a George Bush Presidency and six years of a Republican Congress, voters decided it was time for change. Who can blame them?

Democrats promised voters they would deliver the essential functions of government, such as a dependable economy and consistent national defense, while acting responsibly and effectively. Their promise of post-partisan politics was appealing as well, considering the growing desire among voters to elect representatives who will work for all Americans, not just a political party.

This remains a center-right nation, ideologically, but the last two election cycles demonstrated that Americans are willing to look past differences on the major issues and take a chance on candidates who have promised to be more productive and competent than their predecessors. This represents a shift in the political landscape, away from ideology and towards pragmatism.

To move this country forward, Republicans and Democrats must work together to develop the best solutions for the serious problems our country faces. Just as Republicans and Democrats allied after the disasters of September 11th, both parties must join together to guarantee America's  problems are resolved. As Americans, we must demand that our elected representatives cooperate to solve the very serious dilemmas in America right now.

Some question the conservative credentials of Republicans willing to work with Democrats, but it should be stated that the goal is never to dilute conservatism via compromise. Republicans must never acquiesce or waver in defense of our core conservative principles: strong national defense, free market capitalism, freedom and liberty for individuals, decreased tax burden for all taxpayers, and limited waste in government. While Republicans will not win each battle, we must always be prepared to defend and promote our principles. If not, both Americans and Republicans will lose.

Delivering on the promise of good bipartisan government requires that liberal and conservative tenets are represented in every discussion. Unfortunately, when Republicans offered conservative additions to a very liberal stimulus plan, they were swiftly rejected by Congressional Democrats and President Barack Obama. We should all support Republican Congressmen in their fight to protect capitalism and lower taxes on middle and low-income workers.

Regrettably, vocal conservatives derided their actions as traitorous, instead of rallying support. This criticism is not only juxtaposed to the economic interests of the country, but also inhibits Republican efforts to rebuild our damaged credibility. As a party, we cannot afford to become marginalized reactionaries who simply oppose for the sake of opposition. The outcome of such mindless opposition would be legislation without input from Republicans, robbing Americans of conservative principles that will help in these difficult times.

With Democrats controlling the executive and legislative branches of government, they will undoubtedly advance a liberal agenda. Because of such control, Republicans have only two clear choices of action—fight Democrats in futility or collaborate to ensure our conservative principles are represented. But be forewarned, trading insults back and forth will not stall overtly liberal plans.

Once both political parties acknowledge the benefit of collaboration, they will be able to provide the most needed improvements for our nation. Republicans will also receive an invaluable opportunity to reassert credibility and narrow the trust gap with the American people. When this is combined with expanded outreach to young and minority voters, Republicans will enjoy a vastly improved electoral outlook.

In the end, it doesn't matter to most Americans if something comes from a Democrat or Republican. Everyone desires a government that works. Americans must demand that both Republicans and Democrats place America ahead of partisanship. It's imperative that we are all Americans first, partisans second.

Lauren is the Head Editor at New Republicans and a Senior at West Coast Baptist College in Los Angeles. Patrick is the Chairman Emeritus of the Texas Federation of College Republicans and a Sophomore at Collin College in Dallas. Both are experienced campaign staffers.

When it comes to the macroeconomic/world finance stuff, I defer to folks who live and breathe it.

So when Red State's Francis Cionfrocca calls the supporting documents behind Obama's trillion dollar deficit spending scheme "a marketing piece targeted at the ignorant, rather than a serious argument."  well, I take notice.

Being a former "country banker" I do know when someone throws a "plug number" into a prospectus to make it "work". And by assuming today's bizarre climate of virtually zero interest on federal debt is sustainable, the Obama team has done just that. They also seem to assume, for whatever unstated reason, that a tax rebate in 2009 will be spent when the tax rebate in 2008 wasn't

Given at least one material aspect of the plan isn't credible, how is anything else proposed credible besides the price tag?

Perhaps they are just being irrationally exuberant about this endeavor. But funky balance sheets sorta occasioned every other fiscal fiasco of the past decade---Enron, Fannie Mae, Worldcom, Bear Stearns, AIG....

I used to deal with distressed assets in the 7-8 zero range and the owners were always coming in with deals that would "work"---yeah, if you could charge Greenwich style rents in downtown Hartford. The joke was the appraisals were "MAI" in two senses...the appraiers was "Member, Appraisal Institute" and the work product was "Made As Instructed".

Methinks we'd better read the fine print carefully on the thousand billion dollar bill of goods the new President wants to have signed off on.

President-elect Barack Obama has laid out a plan to “create or save” three million jobs during his first two years in office. His plan is to increase government spending, deficit be damned, by at least $775 billion dollars over that same period. While the projects he plans to invest in are things that we Americans can all use, the stimulus plan will be a flop. Here’s how I got here:

Let’s start with the money. Obama plans to increase government spending without any increases in taxes, so that negates his use of PAYGO budgeting. At the same time, the total amount of money per job that he creates or saves will come out to more than $258,333 per job. There are business executives who don’t even make this money for their job, yet Obama, who has never held a private sector job in his lifetime figures the cost of a job to “create or save” at more than one quarter of a million dollars.

Any reasonable businessperson, like myself, will tell you that if it cost that much money to save a job, we would rather sooner terminate the job immediately. The problem here is that Obama and the other people in government have no real concept of what it costs to run a business, generally speaking. The purpose of a business is not to make customers happy or to employ as many people as possible. The end goal of a business is maximizing their profits and making their shareholders money. Those who do not live by that mantra of making money for the company and stockholders quickly go out of business.

The two things that the average person on the street does not realize are how much one billion is and how much one trillion is.  For the concept of one billion dollars, imagine that on the day of the birth of Jesus Christ you were given one billion dollars and had to spend $1,000 each day onward while gaining no interest, you would be still be spending money for at least the next 700 years.  By comparison, one trillion dollars is one thousand times one billion.

Second, according to the CIA Factbook, the current Gross Domestic Product (GDP, or the total value of all goods and services produced inside the borders of the United States) currently sits at $14.334 trillion. In other words the stimulus is only 5.4 percent of GDP. From here, that percentage goes down fast.

In the Highway Spending Bill that Congress recently passed, less than 26 percent of that money was spent within the first fiscal year. If this holds true, it then means that a value of less than one-and-a-half percent of the nation’s GDP will be infused in to the economy within the first fiscal year of the stimulus bill’s existence. For an economy that will be going in to a deep recession throughout 2009, this does not bode well for Obama.

The end result is an increase in inflation thanks to the increase of the deficit to a level that will approach or exceed two trillion dollars this fiscal year and a slow-to-respond stimulus bill that will actually, when implemented, cause the death of many jobs.

However, that is only half the story about Obama’s economic plans for America. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wants to get Obama to sign the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) which is Orwellian by name, but will cause considerable damage when implemented and enforced. Barring a miraculous filibuster by the Republicans in the Senate, America’s workforce will become unionized and small businesses will close their doors.

What’s more is that the unions will get the ultimate payback from the Democrats they helped get elected. Their membership and union dues received will increase which will give the unions considerable influence in American politics and with their membership. Also, the union bosses will be able to oversee how each of its members votes in a union election, bringing to an end the secret ballot. If the Senate Republicans cannot stop this bill, small businesses in the United States will either have to shell out more of their money to meet the demands of the unions or they will close their doors, or both.

If this comes in to play, the projections for an unemployment rate of nine percent will look good to Americans because the unemployment rate in the USA will be higher than at any time since Ronald Reagan’s first term following the horrific economic policies of Jimmy Carter. The only difference is that Reagan was able to lower the unemployment rate from its peak in December 1982 of 10.8 percent to 8.3 percent in December 1983 and ultimately to 7.2 percent the very month he won a 49-state landslide win against Walter Mondale. By contrast, Obama won his election with an inflation rate of 1.07 percent and an unemployment rate of 6.7 percent in November 2008.

Finally, research from economists at UCLA determined that the Great Depression lasted seven years longer because of the New Deal. Obama wants to implement the New New Deal almost from the moment he takes office. Considering that the double-digit unemployment rates did not end until 1943, this means that had the New Deal not been implemented by President Franklin Roosevelt, the Great Depression would have ended in 1936 leading to an easy reelection.

The reality is that Obama doesn’t have the luxuries that FDR had when he was President, yet he wants to take us back to the past with an economic policy that exacerbated and extended this long economic slump. If this plan flops (and it will), just like FDR, Obama will come back with a sequel of New New Deal II which will be used as a means to “save” his job during a time of economic distress.

If the Republicans are able to do anything, it will be to vote against the stimulus package and to attempt to block the EFCA. Should this happen, they will have the ability to say that these things are prolonging the economic crisis and that they fought it all the way. If not, they will be on the same side of the line as Obama and the Democrats in 2010 and again in 2012 which could pave the way for two terms of economic agony.

It’s almost crunch time and the Republicans need to fight the expansion of big government early and often, then turn around and use it as a means to defeat Obama and Obamaism when given the opportunities to do so in 2010 and 2012. If not, they will become a permanent minority party with previous successful Presidents like Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, and Ronald Reagan as distant memories of what was once great about America, but never will be again.

It’s time for the GOP to be ready to fight Barack Obama when he’s wrong (like on these matters) and Obamaism. 

I am no economist but in reviewing the assessments and suggestions of those who are major economists, there seem to be some very valid suggestions, at least from what a layman like me can understand.

Despite my own lackof economic expertise, I do know the basic fundamentals of the economy and I believe my understanding of those fundamentals is what can sometimes create some confusion when reviewing the advice of so called financial experts and leading economic government officials.

All the suggestions offered by them are based on spending.

Spending is what grows our economy. The more we consume and spend, the more that is produced. The more that is produced increases the need to employ more people to meet those production needs. By employing more people we are empowering others to spend more and from there the cycle continues in an ever growing circumference of increased wealth.

Sounds pretty simple.

Yet other factors help to complicate things and break the seemingly simple and free flow of this cycle. Things such as unexpected shortages of materials, import and export troubles, natural disasters which influence the chain of events, and many more all factor in the process.

While understanding this, what is responsible for the current economic crisis? Has there been some sort of natural disaster that has depleted a particular basic and essential resource that our economic cycle relies on? Has there been a total collapse of certain industries which have thrown the cycle off with an inordinate amount of unemployment and consumption which further deteriorates the supply and demand cycle.?

To a certain, small extent events like that have taken place but not in some kind of all consuming way. There have been droughts effecting crops and downturns in some markets that have produced layoffs. But none have been to the extent which has, for example made wheat crops extinct or stopped cars from being made. So what’s the problem?

Well in my unprofessional economic opinion the problem is rooted in something that government financial experts are not discussing. In fact, in my opinion, most solutions being initiated by government officials, past, present and future, are the problem. They are trying to put icing on a cake before they baked it. They all promote spending. In tune with the laws of supply and demand, spending is good. However; the focus on spending has been accentuated and promoted so much and for so long that it has brought about a couple of misguided generations that have taken that advice too far. As a society we have become accustomed to spending more than we have and responsibly should.

The predatory promotional practices that financial markets undertake ,in an attempt to make more money of their own, is a big part of the current economic crisis. It is a crisis brought about by the chickens coming home to roost and the bill coming forward to be paid. We have taken the advice of Republican and democrat leaders and we have spent. The government has even taken their own advice and spends.

The government has even spent money in order to give us money to spend with. They call it an economic stimulus. The problem though is that The government doesn’t really have enough money to do that.

1.-They have their own, our own, deficit, and…….

2.- The money they gave us back in this so called stimulus package was ours, so maybe they should have taken less from us in the first place.

Those two points alone raise doubts about the soundness of the “spending solution” given to all of our problems. Yet, those in charge still offer it as the most sound solution to our problems. They even go a step further and ask people not save any of the monies given out in stimulus packages. Although I do not have a problem with spending ........ll you have to do is tag along with me at clothing or shoe store to realize that......., I do have problem with spending money that we don’t have. And there in lies the problem. The promoting of spending practices has created generations of spenders.

These spenders don’t even use real money. They use plastic. We all use plastic. In some instances you can’t even pay for a good or service without credit. This has led to our getting accustomed with living on borrowed money,……. plastic,……..fake money.

For decades now, the government has encouraged this practice. Government policies have encouraged borrowers and lenders to enter into deals that neither really caould afford. The greatest example of this was the Homeownership Initiative that was created under the Clinton administration. It forced lenders to make a significant number of loans available to unqualified borrowers, borrowers who could not pay these loans back. The practice was so popular that it helped to create the banking crisis that ushered in the current crisis.

The promoted “spending” solutions that have dominated our problem solving efforts with the economy are in and of itself part of the problem. Americans need to get back to an economy that is based on sound fiscal policies. That statement brings into play many suggested economic theories and actions but when I write “sound fiscal policies” I am not making reference to some deep epistemology of mankind or the ontology of finances. Nor am I debating the importance of the Keynesian school of thought. I am simply saying that society…..our citizens need to begin living within their means.

If one is not sure if they have enough money to put food on their plate, they should not be buying cell phones and using it to send out text messages asking if they can borrow money for dinner. I mean I am sure AT&T or T-Mobile appreciate the fee that your purchase and contracts will cost you but you will they be pleased with the bill collector that they have to employ to get their money.

My point is, we have gotten away from living within our means. We have become accustomed with living life on borrowed money. This practice has brought us to where we are today. And truth be told, there is no end in site. I believe that we are about to enter a very tough transitional time that will last for many years. It is a time that will have us getting familiar with living within our means.

Doing so will mean less spending. Less spending will lead to less employment, and so on and so on. But this does not mean that the sky will fall and the economy will ultimately implode. It means that we will endure a difficult adjustment period but once we have become reacquainted with real money, sound personal financial habits and living within our means, the economy will eventually stabilize and growth will again be seen.

I am not alone in this thinking.

Former Tennessee Senator Fred Thompson has recently made a video addressing this same issue. In it, he takes a tongue-in-cheek approach to our current “spending solutions”.

Take a moment to view it. You’ll get a kick out of it. It left me wondering where the Fred Thompson, that we see in this video, was when he ran for the G.O.P.’s presidential nomination?

Post Election Toast

The Election Is Over, The Results Are Known.

The Will of the People Has Been Clearly Shown.

So Let All Get Together And Let Bitterness Pass

I'll Hug Your Elephant, And You Kiss My Ass.