New York Times: What Part of 'Stimulus' Don't They Understand?
Knowing the kind of shape the country is in, knowing how much worse it will get, actually makes it physically painful for me to listen to the political kabuki of ideologues like Bobby Jindal and his ilk. Do Republicans ever put the country before their party? The New York Times published this editorial today:
Imagine yourself jobless and struggling to feed your family while the governor of your state threatens to reject tens of millions of dollars in federal aid earmarked for the unemployed. That is precisely what is happening in poverty-ridden states like Louisiana and Mississippi where Republican governors are threatening to turn away federal aid rather than expand access to unemployment insurance programs in ways that many other states did a long time ago.
What makes these bad decisions worse is that they are little more than political posturing by rising Republican stars, like Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana and Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina. This behavior reinforces the disturbing conclusion that the Republican Party seems more interested in ideological warfare than in working on policies that get the country back on track.
Fortunately, as President Obama prepares for his first address to Congress on Tuesday evening, voters of both parties have noticed. About three-quarters of those polled in a recent New York Times/CBS News survey — including more than 60 percent of Republicans — said Mr. Obama has been trying to work with Republicans. And 63 percent said Republicans in Congress opposed the stimulus package primarily for political reasons, not because they thought it would be bad for the economy. It should be sobering news for Republicans that about 8 in 10 said the party should be working in a bipartisan way.
The Republican Party’s attacks on the unemployment insurance portion of the stimulus package are a perfect example. States that accept the stimulus money aimed at the unemployed are required to abide by new federal rules that extend unemployment protections to low-income workers and others who were often shorted or shut out of compensation. This law did not just materialize out of nowhere. It codified positive changes that have already taken place in at least half the states.
To qualify for the first one-third of federal aid, the states need to fix arcane eligibility requirements that exclude far too many low-income workers. To qualify for the rest of the aid, states have to choose from a menu of options that include extending benefits to part-time workers or those who leave their jobs for urgent family reasons, like domestic violence or gravely ill children.
Data from the National Employment Law Project, a nonprofit group, show that 19 states qualify for some of the federal financing and that a dozen others would become eligible by making one or two policy changes. Unemployed workers are worst off in the Deep South, where relatively few people are eligible to receive payments. Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas stand out.
The governors are blowing smoke when they suggest that the federal unemployment aid would lead directly to new state taxes. No one knows what the economic climate will be when the federal aid has been used up several years from now. But by dumping billions of dollars into shrinking state unemployment funds, which puts money into the hands of people who spend it immediately on food and shelter, the stimulus could help the states through the recession and into a time when unemployment trust funds can be replenished. In other words, the stimulus could make a tax increase less likely.
This reminds me of the good old Reagan days, when Ed Meese claimed that there were no homeless in DC. Yeah, right.
Where is the money going to come from? Were stimulating our economy by digging a deeper hole. The hole is problem.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
please provide a (much) better/absolute alternative to this crisis. yes, crisis. remember that is become globally systemic and that other countries are providing money to their respective economies. wallStreet is the main culprit in this deal. the major banks are insolvent. this economy does NOT operate without credit/loans. wallStreet was running a deregulated/casino.
posted better ideas here a number of times and pointed to economists who have as well. I have also posted this question at least a thousand times here and not gotten one good answer to it.
With what money? I posted on it in the Barbara Boxer posted earlier by Susie Madrak. No one wants to stop and consider the idiots who caused this mess are the same ones we are now trusting to have good solutions.
http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/barbar...
What we are doing is making the problem bigger and patting ourselves on the back calling it a good plan. Debt is the problem, you get out of debt by tightening your belt, reduce spending, pay down loans, and stacking away reserves.
None of Obama's stimulus addresses increasing production and exports in this nation. We are the largest debtor nation and importer of goods, The GDP is not a measure of production today but rather a measure of destruction. See here
http://crooksandliars.com/jon-perr/obamas-sum...
This is one of many posts where I mention better ideas.
http://crooksandliars.com/jon-perr/opposing-s...
Honestly all you have to do is listen to those who saw this coming years ago and wrote on it such as Jim Rogers, Marc Faber, Peter Schiff, Robert Kiyosaki, Richard Duncan, Ron Paul. All of whom are being called fringe Austrian School of voodoo economics while those who didn’t see it coming are being lauded for their wonderful insight into the problem.
That ought to tell you something.
Even C&L said Schiff was right
Peter Schiff was right
http://crooksandliars.com/john-amato/peter-sc...
He's still right
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiIYkFXUhHs
You can find a load of links in my posts that lead to economists, investors, and business people who have better ideas.
http://crooksandliars.com/user/1016/comments
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
Where you as worried about where the money was going to come from when we were recklessly cutting taxes and invading countries under false pretenses during the administration of Failure-in-Chief Bush?
We've tried the fantasy of cutting taxes to raise more money off and on (mostly on) for almost 30 years. Since you haven't seemed to figure it out, let me spell it out simply ... Supply. Side. Does. Not. Work.
Also, to stimulate the economy is to spend money. And the best place to do that is by creating jobs and getting people to spend money. And if we're going to create jobs, we might as well get something, other than bombs and aircraft carriers. Lastly, we shouldn't be giving huge amounts to a few companies that will try to horde profit, but spread it around and make sure it goes to employees. That will produce real stimulus.
You can page through my comments here, do a key word search on "Bush", you won't find too many favorable sentiments for him.
http://crooksandliars.com/user/1016/comments
and see I was blasting Bush for doubling our national debt, running an expensive no exit war we were lied into. Reducing taxes for the first time in history during a war. It might surprise you but I voted for Obama, he was a far better choice than McCain. The Republicans are no better, they voted for the bail-out and they were for a stimulus too (they just wanted their own). I am suggesting the stimulus is bad idea all around. We should let the banks fail.
Just as Jim Rogers talked about the Zombie banks in the 1990's in Japan, we see again the banks are walking dead with zero confidence by the people. You can't properly value assets when the incompetent have been bailed out.
Right now I see a lot of people getting behind Obama's plan but not really understanding economics, it's great to be positive but it needs to be based on reality.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
The Nation is turning, wholesale, against the Republicans.
What took everyone else so long?
Good damned question.
Wed, 02/25/2009 - 18:11 — scytherius
The Nation is turning, wholesale, against the Republicans.
That's all we can afford anymore.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
I guess he could have gone with "greg" lol....
The party of "NO" is becoming more irrelevant by the day. It can’t go extinct soon enough.
Is the GOP "permanent majority" in jeopardy???? Ha ha ha. Bunch of fuckers.
far left loon >.<
I guess Bush/war/neocons (etc.) were 'cool' when everyone had a chicken in their pot, but now both wars are lost, the money is spent, and they're in need of food ans sheleter. The self-interested GOP want them to simply snap out of it (and for purely ideological reasons.)
Will the south finally turn on the GOP? Let's hope.
far left loon >.<
Doubt it. Have lots of in laws who still dig repukes. I know, go figure why? I sure in the hell cannot. They must love being unemployed I guess.
If I were a psychopath, I would join the republican party, and get in on the gravy train taking the Teabircher morons to the cleaners.
Is it just me or does ilk now have a negative connotation?
It used to me of a group
But that hermeneutics fer ya.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
How long until they start to flee to Argentina?
DRIVE the f*cker all the way south. I'll chip in the first tank of diesel.
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
Imagine yourself jobless and struggling to feed your family while the governor of your state threatens to reject tens of millions of dollars in federal aid earmarked for the unemployed.
I don't have to imagine it. I live in Texas and my job went away in January. I don't think threatening Perry with my vote is possible though as I have endeavored to make it clear just how much I despise him for his entire tenure as governor.
Barack Obama: Change we can only imagine
... slumdog cadaver is the best the Grand Obstructionist Party can dredge up for 2012, then they really are in bad shape.
Even the cyst-ridden, syphilis-ravaged, vulgar pigboy -- did anybody catch him wallowing and jiggling in his own sweat and bile and pus today as he vociferously defended the Indian exorcist? -- can't save him.
just a couple of minutes of El Pigbo's rant about Bobby-boo on my car radio. I really couldn't believe ol' Rush was gettin' all mushy over a brown guy??
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
with his Dominican boys...
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
So what's the point of this video game
To see how many and how big boogers we can get from "bobby's" nose?
Wait for it, the repugs like rash limpballs will argue those of us laughting at "bobby's" speech are all racists like we were all anti-feminists for opposing palin who also used the same points
Except when the room was unusually cold.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
“[T]he new federal standards would protect more unemployed workers than ever before and bring states like Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas into the 21st century.”
There’s your problem right there. Conservatives have always had problems assimilating with the present. To them change represents the death of the good old days and they will just have none of it. Change gives them the vapors.
What amazed me is how bad the speech was. Terrible oration. Wow.
this is a continuation by jindal to kick more people out of his state. put the burden on other states...jerk
I find it so ironic, that Bobby, the hope for 2012 for the GOP, could so easily be targeted just like Obama was --- Hindu? Was he really born in the USA? Not a Christian??? I mean really. Do they think???
I demand to see his birth certificate!! And, his parents' immigration papers! And, his SAT scores!
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
to see pictures of the exorcism.
of the GOPs racism & bigotry. Obama's skin color is all they can see- and they assume it is why he won the Presidency. Totally twisted thinking.
It's GREAT that Jindal blew it.
It's GREAT that the GOP just doesn't get it.
It's GREAT that they are going back to Gingrich's gameplan from 1992.
That means they will lose more seats in the House and Senate. Keep it up, ya morons!!
Did you used to be concerned?
When Steele was parsing the meaning of 'jobs' and 'work' he was arguing that the gov jobs were temporary. DUH!! Thats the point! Temporary jobs doing much needed infrastructure rebuilding until the private sector is healthy enough to pick the slack again. Which would hopefully be a shorter timeframe than it would be because we've kept all these people employed! SHEESH! Conservatives are like a crotch rash.
He turns down $100 million of a nearly $4 billion package, but the only part he can object to is the aid to the poor. This could lead to higher taxes on the rich so let's not give any aid to the poor, who need the money now and will spend it now. It really makes the entire Republican message so hollow.
Anyone here from (or have family in) Louisiana? What is the reaction from the people and local media in Louisiana to Mr. Jindal's decision to turn away the money? Do they agree with Jindal, or think he's selling out the people in the name of politics?
....did this guy get as far as he did in politics, is my question. And they want this sleeze-ball for the top job?
his own political career, or the GOP as a whole.
This is good stuff , these lunatic Republicans are exposing themselves for what they are , absolute A holes and completely mad , watch the polls , even their own are abandoning ship now . Tom Delay , the horses ass of horses asses ,was on hardball today completely blasting Obama and his speech ( Ford did a great job in rebuttal ) . Delay was so outrageous that he surely did Obama and the Democrats a favor , they don't get it , their mode of operation will not work any more , even the moronic Republican faithful are finally seeing what we have seen and known for eight years or more and now they too are feeling the consequences of electing these lunatics and jackasses.
Insanity , it is what it is , there is no understanding it .
When Jindal came tiptoeing up to the camera at his gov mansion after the Obama speech, he kind of reminded me of Rod Serling sneaking onto center stage to introduce an episode of Twilight Zone.
I can't believe the GOP seriously thought anyone would take seriously a guy who looks and sounds like Jindal as a potential presidential candidate. He is like a combination of Gomer Pyle, Barney Fife, Kenneth the Intern on 30 Rock, and Chris Elliot as the guy who used to crawl out from under the seat on the original David Letterman late night series.
I've got the wrong Chris Elliot character. Jindal is more like Elliot when he did his interpretation of Rocketman. Apologies.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56g2gNdWxxw&fe...
...but someone said Jindal looked like the pizza delivery guy.
Mr. Jindal is Governor of Louisiana, a state where the Arts are an important sector of the economy, yet he chooses to demonize the National Endowment for the Arts in a petty attempt to gain a few political points.
This is not an action of a competent governor or an adequate mind.
Bobby, you misunderstood...Slumdog Millionaire won the Oscar, not the Presidency.
Im also from louisiana and this stae is in such disrepair its sad to see but his speech it depends on who you ask the old white guy network he got them all gooey in there boxers then again who cares there diein out but most of the people I talked to thought he did a horrible job and to bring up katrina was laughable going on about monitors for valcanos what does he think the gulf coast is the only place that should have an early warning system?? and mag lift trains he jindal look at japan and france and the rest of the civilized world were way behind on the technology you putz clean safe technology at that...oh and by the way he looked and sounded more like the love child of mr.rogers and howdy doddy splinters and all
Hey, who cares if republican'ts are blowing smoke
They'll soon be dropping dead from lung cancer.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
The trillion dollars of it, since 1969, that could have been saved and used for all the things we really, really need right now. Where'd all that money go? Into the maw of the behemoth called the War on Drugs, and all that it sh!ts out for the money are prisons.
Joe and Josephine Sixpack are gonna need unemployment insurance money, and lots of it. Money that's presently being dumped by the scores of billions yearly into that monster's mouth. Fat lot of good it's going to do the kids of families on the skids to 'protect the children from druuuuuuugs!" when homelessness and malnutrition are rapidly becoming a greater concern.
Some things desperately need funding...and that funding could be accomplished by re-allocating the money used to quixotically 'fight drugs' and put it where it can do the most good. And the sooner the electorate makes that clear to types like Jindal, the better...
Uncaring, ignorant, Reslugs are killing themselves slowly and surely. It's great news for all Americans.
We suffer from Jindal disease in Minnesota as well.
We have A Governor that has put his own Political Ambitions over
the needs of the People that he represents. In Minnesota we call this
Pawlenty of Bullshit.
Just face the truth, Republican politicians HATE people who work.
Bobby Jindal is seen as a leader for the GOP because they honestly think that they are going to retake congress in 2010. That is why they are still doing the same old things like rejecting stimulus bills and offering tax cuts for out problems. They believe this in my opinion. They think that once we (somehow) get tired of Obama, Jindal will come in and everything will be alright for republicans.
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