Just How Much Is Enough? « Kevin Tracy

Just How Much Is Enough?

Posted By Travis Gearhart at 7:16 pm on December 8, 2009

33“President Barack Obama called for a major new burst of federal spending Tuesday, perhaps $150 billion or more, aiming to jolt the wobbly economy into a stronger recovery and reduce painfully persistent double-digit unemployment.” (AP)

Ok…my question is this: just how much stimulus is needed before this administration realizes that it doesn’t work? I actually had to write a ten page paper on the “Spendulus” bill last night for my Poly Sci class, and after writing about how much of a dismal failure that bill was, I get to wake up this afternoon to read crap like this.

“Despite Republican criticism concerning record federal deficits, Obama said the U.S. has had to “spend our way out of this recession” with so many people out of work but insisted he was still mindful of a need to confront soaring deficits.” Isn’t that an oxymoron?! We need to “spend our way out of the recession”  yet be mindful of deficits.

What was even funnier about the piece was that Senator Gregg, who was at one point named as member of Obamas cabinet to help show America that Obama was being fiscally minded, had this to say: “At least the president’s proposal will result in one new job — he’ll need to hire a magician to make this new deficit spending appear fiscally responsible.” So what, exactly, makes Gregg unqualified now to weigh in on this, as opposed to a year ago? Nothing, because he is right.

We can’t spend our way out of this. The last major “stimulus” that was passed was passed with a promise that unemployment would not reach ten percent, and we all know how that worked out. Is Obama the only one to blame (I already know what his rhetoric in favor of this will be, so I thought I’d address that issue before he does)? No. Bush spent a whole Hell of a lot of money that we didn’t have. However, Bush hasn’t been in office for some time now. This economy is Obamas baby now.

“To find money to pay for the new programs, the administration is pointing to the Treasury Department’s report on Monday that it expects to get back $200 billion in taxpayer-approved bank bailout funds faster than expected.

But Republicans cried foul, claiming that the leftover and repaid TARP money must be used exclusively for deficit reduction or additional bank bailouts, as the law setting it up spells out, and not for what amounts to an expensive new stimulus program to create jobs.

“The stimulus money clearly was a spending bill. TARP was a loan — a loan to be paid back. And we know that a number of the banks are, in fact, paying it back,” said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. “So I don’t think raiding a loan program to launch another spending spree is the best way to create jobs.”

Yes, Republicans are once again on the right side of the fence when it comes to fiscal issues, and that is something to be acknowledged. Hopefully this will be the final nail in the coffin that is the 2010 elections. And whats helping even more so is that far left lunatic groups are making comments along the lines of Karen Dolan of the Institute for Policy Studies: “He’s finally tapping into that moral outrage of the American people at the Wall Street bailouts.”

It’s pathetic, really. The moral outrage at the Wall Street bailouts, yes, absolutely, I was opposed to the Wall Street bailouts with the same heated fervor that I’m opposed to ALL bailouts, wasted spending, and faux stimulus. However, where the Hell do people like Dolan think that this money comes from? Thin air? It’s times like these I actually would LOVE for our companies over here to close up shop and ship off overseas, just to prove a point. Because when their biggest tax contributors (the top 1% in the income bracket) decide that they’ve had enough, they’ll leave and screw over EVERYBODY in that region (next weeks Friday post on www.infairtax.nign.com will deal with this subject a little more).

“A Labor Department report on Tuesday showed there were about 6.3 unemployed people, on average, for each job opening in October. Comparable November figures were not yet available.”

Don’t these statistics take into account that it is the holiday season? This makes perfect sense to me that the unemployment rate would drop to just 10% (and I laugh out loud as I type JUST 10%) from 10.2, because businesses are hiring temporary help to stem the tide of holiday shoppers.

I just don’t get it. It’s like my wife telling me “OH honey I HAD to buy this dress, my friend that you gave the loan to paid back some of it, so we had extra money!” I haven’t actually loaned any money to one of my wifes’ friends, but you all get the analogy I’m sure.

4 Comments »

  1. Comment by kevintracy on December 9, 2009

    A country can’t spend its way out of debt. Even if the Chinese finance that spending.

  2. Comment by LD Jackson on December 9, 2009

    Travis,
    Good article and very informative. Let me bring your attention to something and you can correct me if I am wrong.

    And whats helping even more so is that far left lunatic groups are making comments along the lines of Karen Dolan of the Institute for Policy Studies: “He’s finally tapping into that moral outrage of the American people at the Wall Street bailouts.”

    The statement Karen Dolan made jumped out at me. If I am not mistaken, Barack Obama was very much in favor of the bailouts for Wall Street? He showed no moral outrage at them, even though the majority of Americans were not if favor of them.

    When the elections of 2010 are over and conservatives have regained control of at least part of Congress (very hopeful and wishful thinking), then I hope they stand their ground on these fiscal issues, instead of spending like a drunken sailor, once they have the purse strings.

  3. Pingback by Tweets that mention Just How Much Is Enough? | Kevin Tracy -- Topsy.com on December 9, 2009

    [...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Kevin Tracy and LD Jackson, LD Jackson. LD Jackson said: How much more money is President Obama going to be willing to spend? It is money we do not have in the first place. http://su.pr/24AEkJ [...]

  4. Comment by briand on December 10, 2009

    You touched on what enables all of this with the simple phrase “where the Hell do people like Dolan think that this money comes from? Thin air?” People do not know where the money comes from (hint – audit the Fed). And they do not know why we can’t spend our way out of a recession (hint – the progression of compounding interest). Unfortunately most people will never understand and will continue to vote for idiots like Obama, Bush, and McCain. And we will still have billions spent on bankers, a trillion spent on stimulus, and another trillion spent on wars.

RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL

Leave a comment

Facebook YouTube My Space Flickr Twitter Zannel Digg KTracy.com RSS Feed

Powered by WordPress