Fighting For The Stimulus Story

“Alaska’s Sarah Palin, Texas’ Rick Perry and Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal. You can draw your own conclusions.”
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Both are making a lot of trips to South America?

…with value-added eye-popping pictures and charts that you can’t get online…
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Why not, Michael? The technology certainly exists to provide them.
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Trying to kill a few more trees, are we?

So, what your story makes clear, is that playing defense against scurrulous attacks is actually slowing the dissemination of the funds and costing jobs. Of course, if the object of the game is to inject money into the economy and create jobs, then the fact that some of the projects sound silly is irrelevant. Once workers have spent their wages at the grocery store, what they were doing to earn it ceases to matter. The funds have done their job.

I love ole Joe Biden. Wonder how Carney likes working for him. You heard anything from Jay lately, Michael?

Not a word about oversight mechanisms either, Mikey.
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You’re your usual thorough self, when it comes to spending. You cover both sides of the issue, mainly, you have your usual GOP stance, and in addition, after a couple rounds of outrage earlier in the year over excesses by the recipients of bailout money, you are all for oversight, except when it slows down the disbursement of funds!
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Oh, well!
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Mikey won’t like this, but it’s Money mag saying increase taxes:
http://money.cnn.com/2009/07/01/news/economy/health_care_reform/index.htm

“Both are making a lot of trips to South America?”
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Which two are sharing the brain?

Good points PD. Unfortunately, on the Hill it seems that doing what’s best takes a back seat to “how will this play in the next election”.

Which two are sharing the brain?
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I vote Rick and Sarah. Between the two, you MIGHT get an intelligent statement.
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Jidal, while not that dynamic, appears to have more than two brain cells in communication with each other.

Oh boy, more proof that lobbyists aren’t the problem in D.C. It is lobbyists that pretend to be journalists.
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=3B5502AA-18FE-70B2-A8FD90B34E41BF57
For $25,000 to $250,000, The Washington Post is offering lobbyists and association executives off-the-record, nonconfrontational access to “those powerful few” — Obama administration officials, members of Congress, and the paper’s own reporters and editors.

It’s as good a time as any to point out that many of the sorts of things that Republicans have chosen to point and laugh at are in fact rather crucial programs. I still view “Hog Manure Odor Abatement” as the perfect example in recent times. Its a serious problem that “Free Markets’ are utterly helpless to solve.

pafro:
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Isn’t this more than a bit “Blagojevich-ish”?
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And if you give more than 250k, is that when they kick in with the more “confrontational” stuff?
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As one can see, I don’t have a lot to contribute here except to point out that it is likely oversight that is causing the bulk of the delays. He isn’t going to disburse until there’s a mechanism to receive the money, and I think Mikey would have been much more on the mark to include that aspect of the delays.
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The alternative is the Pre-Obama Bernanke throwing open the back door of Treasure and saying:
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“Crunch all you want! We’ll make more!*”
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*:
http://moneynews.newsmax.com/streettalk/bailout_total_trillions/2008/11/24/154693.html

Its a serious problem that “Free Markets’ are utterly helpless to solve.
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PD,
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Free markets are reactive and that takes time. Being reactive, they really have a problem with addressing issues “coming down the pike”.
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Need to provide something to everyone, regardless of their ability to pay for it (like a vaccine for a pandemic)? Nope.
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Need to change a presently profitable industry because of FUTURE environmental damage? Nope. No money in it RIGHT NOW. By the time there is, it may be too late for the change to make a difference.
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Free markets assume we always have time to react to circumstances and that there will be no adverse effects if we do not try to plan ahead.

MS:
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Why no brand name for the “double-chocolate protein bar?” Is there some reason you’re particularly beholden to the Coca-Cola Company?
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Seriously, why did the “interesting fact” about three governors not “make it into the story?” It would seem at least as relevant and newsworthy as anything that did make the cut. Do you or your editors restrict broader dissemination of facts that might reflect poorly on Republicans, circulating those facts only to the Swampland readership?

This is a result of the obstructionism that is rarely pointed out. They delay the spending by fussing and throwing up roadblocks so they can say see — the program didn’t work.
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I so agree with Paul Dirks that many of the programs that are highlighted as foolish work to solve serious problems that the private sector can’t or won’t address. Another one was one on honeybee research – collapsing hive disorder is threatening all our crops and they really need to find the cause or an alternative. Making fun of it is not the answer.

Thanks 53_3 for your link at 10:28.
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I thought this was interesting:
”Under Obama’s budget, Gale and Auerbach estimate the fiscal gap would be 9% of GDP. Conceptually, that means to restore fiscal balance over the long-term the federal government would need to increase taxes by 9% of GDP or cut spending by that amount starting now and lasting “until the end of time,””
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For prospective, I checked GDP figures in 2008- the CIA estimates US GDP is $2.231 trillion. So the 9% “gap” is roughly $200 million. I also found that US military spending in 2008 is approx $711 million (48% of the World’s Total Military Spending). Therefore, a 28% decrease in our total military spending would cover the gap entirely.
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Why are our elected reps, media outlets and every citizen not screaming about this? (Rhetorical question, the answer is too depressing)

200 billion – not million – but your arithmetic stands.

I think, pintortwo, because whatever is not in vogue, such as the link I posted at 10:48, gets put on “relentlessly ignore” by everyone.
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Commenters, pundits, and politicos alike. I can’t say why exactly, but I can guess.
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Even though we view ourselves as free thinkers, there’s always the attraction of debating deep, deep, deep technical issues regarding this or that while the answer wings it’s way from horizon to horizon, and no one bothers to look up.
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Think of the revenues collected if we were to have real healthcare in this country, relieving our business community of the equivalent of $5/hour per worker!
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Wow. All of a sudden, our businesses would be on a level playing field with the rest of the developed worlds’ businesses, our exports would rise, small business would flourish, and on top of that, the issue of jobs and illegals would be ameliorated by the fact that American workers would again look at “the jobs no American will do” simply because they would not be shopping health care along with the wages!
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People don’t realize just how much health care reform would feed into the immigration issue in a way that is fair to all, regardless of which side of that issue one is on. A big plus!
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But, of course, that’s one of those facts that flies from horizon to horizon, and never gets really addressed!

Yeah PD, thanks. $200 billion, $711 billion.

pintortwo:
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I know we can save $200 billion just by winding down the Iraq war, eventually getting out of Afghanistan (as soon as practically possible), and other measures too.
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That loophole closure that will put the Cayman Islands out of business is supposed to bring in $21 billion, and that’s 10% right there.

As for my link at 10:48, I might point out that that is four times our GDP (using pintortwo’s figures).
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One has to remember that Mikey and others who complain about spending must realize that the alternative to control and oversight as put in to practice by the Obama administration must therefore be of the nature of Bernanke’s handouts prior to Feb 20, 2009!
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Can one imagine the screaming from the right about waste and pork if Obama didn’t exercise the controls he placed on the money?

@53,
That echos something I pointed out yesterday. The Right is trying to play two sides at once. The stimulus is a horible waste of money that we nevertheless aren’t spending fast enough!

“That echos something I pointed out yesterday. The Right is trying to play two sides at once. The stimulus is a horible waste of money that we nevertheless aren’t spending fast enough!”
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No, genius. The whole stimulus idea was that we needed to pump vast amounts of borrowed money into the economy immediately so that we could head off the effects of the recession (how effective that would have been is a question for another day). Well, if the money ultimately gets spent down the road, it’s still a waste of money, but it doesn’t even stimulate anything now.
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That’s not playing two sides at once–it’s just pointing out that we got the worst of all possible worlds. Vast wastage and little or no stimulus.
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Maybe the press could stop calling this the “stimulus” bill . . . .

How true, PD.
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It’s just entirely too bad that Mikey hasn’t shown himself to be capable of thinking beyond the box he’s in. He’s gotta kneejerk this, which is a disservice to all.

Did I hear a fart upslope on the fog shrouded scree above?

53_3, you did, that was just Obama testing your lingual devotion.

TIME (with a value-added eye-popping picture and charts that you can’t get online, so subscribe, $1.99 for six weeks)

Damm!

I love how Republicans first opposed Obama and the Democrats for the stimulus package…and now blame them for it being insufficiently stimulating.
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It reminds me of the old Borscht Belt joke about two women complaining about the food in a restaurant.
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The first says “The food in this restaurant is terrible.” The second says, “Yes, and the portions are too small.”

sqaure1, your comment is goofy. Part of the criticism was that the “stimulus” wasn’t gonna stimulate or that the stimulus was not going to be worth the massive cost. So how is it wrong to say that the “stimulus” isn’t working? Obama said that if we passed the stimulus, the unemployment figures would not rise above X. It’s past that.
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And that’s right, cap and trade isn’t going to be a drag on the economy–JNS said so.

On the subject of X:
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So let me help square1, et al evaluate this in the light of truth:
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We are currently at 9.1%, which is less than X…
http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet?series_id=LNS14000000
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And Obama said X was…
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=auTTvgeN294Y
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And,
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/11/business/economy/11jobs.html

53_3 25, spob 0…

oops. That shuld be 9.5% as the linked table states. Doesn’t change anything, though…

http://otrans.3cdn.net/45593e8ecbd339d074_l3m6bt1te.pdf
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Take a look at figure 1.

No pics of Amy with the subscription?

http://budget.house.gov/hearings/2009/01.27.2009_Zandi_Testimony.pdf
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Take a look at the fiscal stilulus multipliers on page 10.

if we passed the stimulus, the unemployment figures would not rise above X
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What are the odds that that actually reflects what Obama said?
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Hmmm
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Once a lying hack, always a lying hack.

I guess what spob can’t grasp is that it isn’t hard, if you have half a brain, to figure out that you have two choices:
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1. Figure that maybe, just maybe, that reality may differ with predictions and that instant gratification may not be the best approach to everything, or, in spob’s case,
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2. Continue marching in lockstep toward the cliff, all the while blaming Obama.
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When you really think about it, given that Limbaugh blamed Obama for Sanford’s indescretions, spob’s selection of #2 as the road to take isn’t all that surprising!
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53_3 26, spob 0.

Notice to all:
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I hereby will cease poking the animals. Sorry!

Guys, take a look at figure 1 in the link . . . . has the predictions with and without “stimulus”.

Second, as emphasized above, there is considerable uncertainty in our estimates: both the impact of the package on GDP and the relationship between higher GDP and job creation are hard to
estimate precisely. In light of the substantial quarter-to-quarter variation in the estimates of job creation, we believe a reasonable range for 2010Q4 is 3.3 to 4.1 million jobs created.
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It should be understood that all of the estimates presented in this memo are subject to significant margins of error. There is the obvious uncertainty that comes from modeling a hypothetical
package rather than the final legislation passed by the Congress. But, there is the more fundamental uncertainty that comes with any estimate of the effects of a program.
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The document is honest about it’s uncertainty. HWSNBN, not so much.
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Once a dishonest hack, always a dishonest hack.

PD, they used this to sell the “stimulus”, and, by the way, is it really ok for you guys to be reminding people of the fine print.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/04/AR2009020403174.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
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You might also read up on what Obama actually put to paper. Come on guys. Read the editorial, he’s
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And by the way, guys, when you toss around “Great Depression”, you really don’t get to say, “gee, it was worse than I thought”.
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There’s more fun in there too—”unprecedented transparency” etc. etc.

With it, we will create or save more than 3 million jobs over the next two years,
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Hmm, last time I checked two years wasn’t up just yet.
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It would again appear that those willing to declare failure are dishonest hacks, uninterested in anything but spouting invective.

PD, there were predictions made as to the rate of unemployment. And that editorial is pretty rosy. Come on. Can’t you just admit that Obama overhyped the stimulus? It isn’t that hard.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/01/business/01leonhardt.html?_r=1
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If the NYTimes is saying you got carried away, then . . . .

The first explanation is that the economy has deteriorated because the stimulus package failed. Some critics say that stimulus just doesn’t work, while others argue that this particular package was too small or too badly constructed to make a difference.
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The second answer is that the economy has deteriorated in spite of the stimulus. In other words, the patient is not as sick as he would have been without the medicine he received. But he is a lot sicker than doctors realized when they prescribed it.
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To me, the evidence is fairly compelling that the second answer is the right one. The stimulus package does seem to have helped. But its impact has been minor — so far — compared with the harshness of the Great Recession.
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Yet another argument in favor of the stimulus. What was the point again?
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Oh yeah, fling shit in hopes some sticks…..

PD, I wasn’t vouching for the NYTimes article–just using it to buttress my point that the used these predictions to sell this bill.
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And I am not sure that the piece is really an argument in favor of “the” stimulus, but rather in favor of “stimulus” in general. You spend $787 billion, and the impact is “minor”.
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Guys, the American people were sold a bill of goods. Our kids are gonna pay for this.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/02/AR2009070202771.html?hpid=topnews
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After all the fulminating at Bush, it seems more and more Bush policies make sense to the Obama Administration. Is it only ok when libs do it?

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