It's not a wish list, it's a jobs jar!

Updated.

I liked how Barney Frank went after Jim "Let It All Come Crashing Down Around Our Ears Just Give My Friends Their Tax Breaks" De Mint last week.

"No tax break built a road," Frank told him.  "No tax cut puts a cop on the street."

Good stuff to keep in mind.  Important.  What's also important is to point out when Republicans attack the stimulus as just a Democratic wish list, a letter to a Liberal Santa Claus asking for the ponies they didn't get for the last 14 Christmases, is that it's not a wish list, it's a jobs jar! 

We're not giving gifts to the already over-gifted--that's what the Republican proposals for more tax breaks are.  Their tax break for new housing isn't meant to help people buy new homes.  It's meant to lure them into banks to take out new loans.  It's a way of bringing in new suckers...Sorry...customers, which is all people are to Republicans, when they're not serfs, livestock, and cannon fodder.  The Democrats are proposing to do things for the people and the country that need to be done. 

Republicans are whining that a lot of these things are things Democrats have been wanting do for decades and aren't actually reactions to the current economic hard times.  You bet they are.  Because they're things that have needed to be done for decades, things that if they had been done might have staved off or at least lessened the blow.  They are things that would have made the country safer---how many people did terrorists kill in Minneapolis and New Orleans, President Bush?  None, right?  Great comfort to the grieving families in both places.---and more prosperous, and more pleasant and rewarding to live in. 

They are things that would have made us and our children healthier.

They are things that would have put more people to work in good, well-paying jobs with decent benefits, and sent more people to college, and allowed more people to start new businesses.

They are things that would have and should have been done in better times, if the Republicans hadn't gotten in the way because they think that the point of good times is to reward the rich by looting the treasury and screwing the working class and the middle class while telling them to suck it up and stop whining, because at least you've got cable.

They are things that are absolutely essential in hard times, things nobody in their right minds who cares about what's happening would oppose, except that the Republicans think that the point of hard times is to reward the rich by looting and treasury and screwing the working class and the middle class and telling them to suck it up and stop whining, because at least you've still got cable.

The bill isn't perfect, but what work of human hands or minds is?  Republicans have been using the perfect as the enemy of the good since the days of Jane Addams and Bob La Follette.  If a piece of Progressive legislation can't solve everything, they've argued, then it's better to solve nothing.  This bill won't solve everything.  And it probably isn't big enough to solve enough.  There are things in it that probably don't need to be taken care of right this minute or with this bill and there are things that are in it just to give somebody's brother-in-law work.  It's not perfect.  But it's far from a being just a wish list.

Like I said, it's a jobs jar.  Reach in, pull out a piece of paper, and almost certainly what's written there is a project that should have been started and finished eight years ago.

It's not a frivolous orgy of gift giving to special interests.

That's what Republicans are for.

_______________________

Me, above:  "They are things that are absolutely essential in hard times, things nobody in their right minds who cares about what's happening would oppose..."

John Cole, more or less:  "Who says the Republicans are in their right minds?"

John, completely:  "I really don’t understand how bipartisanship is ever going to work when one of the parties is insane. Imagine trying to negotiate an agreement on dinner plans with your date, and you suggest Italian and she states her preference would be a meal of tire rims and anthrax."

John's right, about some of these people, for sure.  They really don't seem to understand what the words "problem" and "solution" mean in this universe.  "Cause" and "effect" have wildly different definitions in their worlds too.  But I think that what I said about "nobody in their right minds who cares about what's happening"  applies to just as many.  They're sane, but they don't care, if sanity and not caring aren't oxymoronic.  In fact, they are almost gleeful about what's happening.  Hard times give them more opportunities to count their own blessings, which they always do by sadistically comparing them to other people's misfortunes.   They enjoy their own lives more when they see other people are enjoying theirs less.

To riff on John's metaphor, it's as if you're trying to negotiate dinner plans and when you suggest Italian your date says, "I don't care where we eat just as long as we get to pass by a soup kitchen on our way there so I can yell Losers! out the window of our limo."

Unless your date's George Will, in which case he'll say, "Italian's fine, but can we drive by a McDonald's on the way so I can show you how times can't be all that hard if so many people are buying an Extra Value Meal?"

_____________________

Despite my worries, I still think the President's commitment to bi-partisanship and post-partisanship is more of a strategy than a vanity.  It's a strategy that has back-fired, though, and I'm glad to see that he appears to be giving it up.

_____________________

Over at Cosmic Variance the other day, John Conway was enthusiastic because of the money the stimulus bill contained for science and research.  Today, JoAnne Hewett reports that "moderates" are stripping that money from the bill.

Also gone is some money for the states to address their shortfalls and money for education.

Updated Saturday morning to add a quote of the day.  Actually, the Republicans have dropped the wish list talk for an exercise in Alice Through the Looking Glass rhetoric.  They're insisting the stimulus bill which will spend money to stimulate the economy is a---gasp!---a bill that will spend money to stimulate the economy!  "This is not a stimulus bill," John McCain has spluttered, "It's a spending bill!"  Ezra Klein responds:

Similarly, this is not a restaurant; it's a place that sells food in exchange for money. And this is not library; it's a facility that lends books. And this is not my mother; it's the woman who gave birth to me and later provided me with sandwiches. And this is not a guy who should be president; it's some grandstanding senator with a very poor grasp of economics!

Comments

[Willie]

I don't think Obama has given up on this "Can't we all get along" business. I do think this is his vanity. Neither he nor the rest of the Democrats have what it takes to make the bill unambiguously a jobs bill based on rebuilding our infrastructure--all 800 billion, no tax cuts or hard to explain benefits to education, etc. These other programs should be in the budget.

President Obama has played this whole thing stupidly in my opinion. As have the Democrats. Name me one Blue Dog or Republican who would vote against a pure infrastructure bill.

Sorry for my tone but the Democrats have really disappointed me on this.

[Ken Muldrew]

Lance wrote: 'To riff on John's metaphor, it's as if you're trying to negotiate dinner plans and when you suggest Italian your date says, "I don't care where we eat just as long as we get to pass by a soup kitchen on our way there so I can yell Losers! out the window of our limo." '

Very similar to something that actually happened here a few years ago. Our premier (Canadian version of a Governor) had been out on the town getting liquored and had his limo driver take him to a homeless shelter on his way home in the early hours of the morning. Premier marches into the shelter and starts verbally abusing some of the unfortunates and then throws money at one guy and says, "get a job, you bum". At this point his handlers managed to pull him away before he got in a little too deep.

The hell of it is, he managed to turn it into a public relations coup, bowing before reporters and swearing that he would give up drinking if they just gave him another chance.

"Look at it gentlemen, and ladies all.... There's a hand that was the hand of a hog; but it ain't so no more; it's the hand of a man that's started on a new life, and'll die before he'll go back. You mark them words—don't forget I said them...."

A very sad reflection on our populace that they fell for this foolishness.

[Linkmeister]

Willie, 36 of 41 Republicans voted for this proposal. I submit that nearly all of those 36 would also have voted against a job bill.

[actor212]

I think Obama's winding up a haymaker. Already, Pelosi's office is releasing jobs numbers that show job losses of 3.5 million over the past fourteen months (when Bush's pathetic jobs creation reached its peak).

The stimulus passed, of course, and will go to conference. It will be fun to watch Republicans swallow hard and vote against jobs.

[Chris The Cop]

Willie managed to say in a much more pithy way what I would have, that there is too much crap in this bill. I don't mind having tax breaks in the stimulus package, but a simple infrastructure jobs bill along the lines of the Depression-era WPA/TVA would suit me just fine.

And it does seem as if the Democrats see this bill as a chance to throw in some wish-list items that don't remotely belong in it.If you want to increase funding for education, you pass an education bill. You don't put it in a stimulus package and then shout out that Republicans are crazy not to vote for it.

It's ironic that Barney Frank, one of the first Democrats to see the urgency of the credit crisis in the Fall, could say something so stupid as "No tax break built a road, no tax cut puts a cop on the street," when tax cuts almost always increase federal revenues, which make these programs easier to afford.

I also think you miss, or mis-characterize, George Will's point, but I've rambled on long enough.

[Linkmeister]

tax cuts almost always increase federal revenues

Chris, that's supply-side faith, which has mostly been diminished by facts. It may happen, but not in the short run. All those new businesses supposedly created aren't instantly profitable, so they don't pay taxes immediately. In the meantime, tax revenues fall.

[Chris The Cop]

Linkmeister: which is it? Has supply side economics "been mostly diminished by facts" or is the answer "it may happen," but only in the long run?

Revenues went up between 50 and 75% after Reagan's tax cuts, (depending on whose figures you use) and the result was 93 months of uninterrupted growth. Doesn't mean Reagan didn't have a hand in the huge comcomittant deficits, but no more than Congress. The month that saw the largest (federal) tax receipts in U.S. history? March, 2007. Now, things certainly have gone in the shitter since, but I haven't heard anyone say the current crisis is because of the tax rate.

Now, granted, there isn't much of a tax rate to cut (Reagan had a 70% ceiling to play with, remember), and the smaller the cut (in percentage points) the less effective it is; but supply side hasn't been proven wrong, just harder to figure out since tax rates can only go down so far and the overall debt (what is it, $9 trillion?-and soon to skyrocket) will eventually put a FUBAR on most any plans either party comes up with.

[Apostate]

Chris, may I recommend Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine? I know it's obnoxious to throw books at someone as a way of responding to an idea, but 1) political economy is too complicated a subject for the comment section of a blog; 2) it would derail the thread and 3) it's a book well worth reading for its own sake, both for its historical examination of world economies and its clear explication of the economic theories of Milton Friedman.

It will also fully address all you are saying about Reagan and supply-siders and tax-cuts (none of which is accurate, as far as my knowledge and study of the subject goes, which is only as far as smarter people like Krugman and Klein have shown the way).

[actor212]

Chris,

How do you explain, then, that when Clinton readjusted the tax rates upward, tax revenues and economic growth were both stimulated? He created the single biggest economic boom in the history of mankind, and did it without a war.

[MaryL]

What very few people are mentioning anywhere in liberal and progressive blogs is that the Democrats don't have the votes to pass this bill in the Senate. If this source is right, the bill needs 60 votes, not a simple majority. They have to peel off some Republicans and get their own idiot Blue Dogs on board. This isn't the old Democratic problem of just rolling over, or yet another example of Reid being scared of a filibuster's shadow: they really, really need to be bipartisan, to some degree, and to appear sufficiently bipartisan to appeal to the public as well.

Obama has done a pretty good job of appearing to hold out his hand and getting it slapped repeatedly, while still getting what he has repeatedly called an imperfect but highly necessary bill. I'm taking Obama's linked speech and the upcoming speech and tour as the necessary big sales job on the value of the stimulus.

[Lance Mannion]

I think people are missing Chris' point, which wasn't a simple supply side argument. I liked what Barney Frank said as a way of shutting De Mint up, but tax breaks do help get things get built, at least at the local level. A lot of new construction gets jumpstarted when the developers are assured that among the first debts they'll have to pay off taxes won't be one of them. The House bill was written without any earmarks, so it isn't as full of pork and earmarks as the Republicans are claiming. It might have been better if the President had submitted an infrastructure bill...and an education bill...and an aid to the states bill...and...and...and...all at once, which would have made the Republicans have to scramble every which way and would have made them have to argue specifically against building roads, keeping schools open, saving the states from bankruptcy etc. That's not what happened, this is what we've got, and it needs to pass just to keep the momentum, whatever's left, going. There's no starting over from scratch. There will be no second shot at this.

MaryL's right, too. I've been thinking about this. The Republicans aren't the problem. Ben Nelson and Claire McCaskill are. The Democrats don't really have a 58 to 41 majority. (Are all the replacements seated, by the way?) They won't have a 59 to 41 majority when Al Franken finally shows up. The breakdown is really something like this:

47 Moderate and Liberal Democrats and 1 socialist
vs.
50 Conservative Democrats and Republicans and Right Wing Nuts and 1 asshole named Joe Lieberman.

Nothing gets passed without Blue Dog votes.

Should be noted too that many of the tax breaks in the both versions of the bill are window dressing---realatively few people are going to take advantage of them. For example, there's a tax break in there for anyone who buys a new energy efficient furnace, washing machine or hot water heater. Unless things get better quick, the only people who are going to take advantage are people who have to replace their old stuff and who can get financing. Which is too bad, because American factories still make furnaces, washing machines, and hot water heaters and it would be great if there was a sudden and giant leap in demand.

Similar arguments for the tax breaks for new home and car buyers. They're not going to cost as much as they would during good times and they're not going to do as much good as they would during good times.

[Apostate]

50 Conservative Democrats and Republicans and Right Wing Nuts and 1 asshole named Joe Lieberman.

LOL