Economic stimulus

On Wednesday I heard a caller to a conservative radio talk show arguing that the economic stimulus package making its way through the legislative process is legit. Waving aside suggestions that the bill represents wasteful spending, he assured the host that government spending was economic stimulus.

That's about the dumbest thing I've ever heard, apart from the fact that it is trivially true in economic terms. Consumer saving through investment and consumer spending also constitute economic stimulus. Pretty much any movement of money through the system is economic stimulus, leaving as the exception pretty much only those folks who bury their money in a wooden chest in the yard or stuff it inside a mattress.

If the economy truly requires a gigantic spending bill from Congress then Congress ought to ensure that the bill contains those measures with the greatest immediate stimulative effect. According to that measure, the Democratic-controlled Congress has failed President Obama and the nation. The bill they produced absurdly suggests that each and every government spending bill should be labeled as a stimulus package.

I have been tracking Obama's early emphasis for his presidency. The pathetic performance of the Democrats on this stimulus package has probably done more than anything else--including Obama's tax-cheating appointments--to damage the new presidency.

If the Democratic Party was interested in supporting Obama then they should have worked much harder to produce the type of bipartisan bill that Obama originally proposed. Apparently they weren't interested in doing that. Instead, they loaded it with the normal list of pet programs.

Hinderaker zings Congress

John Hinderaker, writing at Power Line, produced a delightful zinger aimed at Congress in the wake of their reception of representatives of the Big Three:

Congress has not taken anywhere near enough abuse for treating automobile company executives as morons because their expenses exceed their revenues. In truth, the auto companies made exactly the same mistake Congress did: they failed to anticipate the costs of the pension and health care benefits that they agreed to pay their retired workers.

That will leave a mark, albeit many in Congress are too numb above the neck to take much notice.

The WSJ nails it (I hope)

Want more George W. Bush foreign policy? Elect John McCain – or Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. Regardless of who wins in November, the current foreign policy will live on in the next White House.

None of the main candidates has disavowed the war on terror. Each has called Mr. Bush tactically deficient. But the debate over the war on terror is over how, where and when. The candidates have all argued that they would do a better job of fighting it.

(Wall Street Journal)

That pretty much echoes what I've been saying (more so on message boards than at this blog).

Governments have moved specifiically into alignment with the United States, as the WSJ points out, and anti-Americanism is something of a constant force.

And I've persistently tried to give Democratic leaders the benefit of the doubt that sanity will overcome stupid campaign promises and pandering to the antiwar far left.

Florida Dems pull plug on attempts at primary do-over

No surprises there. I never thought it would happen:

MIAMI (Reuters) - Florida's Democratic Party said on Monday it would no longer push for a rerun of the state's invalid primary election to pick a presidential nominee, leaving a decision on what to do with the state's delegates entirely to the national party.

The chairwoman of the Florida Democratic Party, Karen Thurman, said thousands of voters had sent in messages expressing their preference after the Democratic National Committee invalidated the January 29 balloting to punish Florida for holding its primary early.

(Reuters)

The DNC is left with the delegate mess squarely in their lap. The party that fought disenfranchisement of hundreds of (allegedly) disenfranchised voters in 2000 deliberately disenfranchised the entire state from its primary process (based on a party rule, to be sure).

The way they run their party is the way they'd run the country: disorganized, ineffective, and (at times) just plain crazy.

*****

Senator Clinton nab$ Vilsack'$ endor$ement

I've been picking Hillary Clinton to win the Democratic nomination for President. Her savvy campaigning, I thought, would help her fend off challengers Barack Obama and John Edwards.

I had no idea.

Shortly after endorsing Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign, former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack received nearly $90,000 in donations to his defunct presidential campaign from some of Clinton's major backers, campaign finance reports show.

The donations, disclosed in Federal Election Commission filings over the weekend, came from Clinton fundraising bastions of New York, California, Texas, and Washington, D.C.
(LA Times)

Legal? I don't see why not.

Ethical? I don't see how.

The article quotes a Clinton campaign spokesperson as saying that the Clintons and Vilsack go way back. It was admitted that a commitment was made to retire Vilsack's campaign debt, but denied that the deal included Vilsack's endorsement.

Perhaps I'm just ignorant of the way high-strata society operates, but organizing to have one's political supporters give money to a different candidate where that money goes in the pocket (repaying a loan from Vilsack to his campaign) seems more than a little fishy. Was Vilsack buds with any of the other Democratic candidates? Did they also help retire his debt?

Looks and smells like quid pro quo.

Hat tip to Captain's Quarters.