What We Get for 700+ Billion Dollars

"How much are politicians straining to convince people that the government is stimulating the economy? In Oregon, where lawmakers are spending $176 million to supplement the federal stimulus, Democrats are taking credit for a remarkable feat: creating 3,236 new jobs in the program's first three months.

But those jobs lasted on average only 35 hours..." [link]

Money well spent don't you think?

Hope and change, I hope everyone wants some change now.

Did You Really Think This Wouldn't Happen?

"Counties suffering the most from job losses stand to receive the least help from President Barack Obama's plan to spend billions of stimulus dollars on roads and bridges, an Associated Press analysis has found.

Altogether, the government is set to spend 50 percent more per person in areas with the lowest unemployment than it will in communities with the highest." [link]

Really doesn't make much since, when jobs are promised via the stimulus to give money to the areas where the jobs are needed least. Of course, no one thought that the government would actually get it right did they?

Our Tax Dollars at Work

"Talks between the Treasury Department and lenders aimed at keeping Chrysler LLC out of bankruptcy broke down late Wednesday, making it all but certain that the car maker will file for Chapter 11 protection Thursday..." [link]

Let me get this straight, taxpayers pump billions into this corporation (not willfully mind you, but forced by the government both the Bush and Obama administration) being told it is the only way to save it, and it still tanks? Aren't you glad the government is here to help us?

Spend it Like You Got it O!

"...Obama has shown he isn't afraid to spend billions of dollars on corporate bailouts or to run up trillions of dollars in U.S. debt to battle an economic crisis.

But in doing so, he has initiated the largest expansion of federal government since World War II and set up a massive challenge for his administration -- one that officials are already warning will be fraught with peril.

...Timothy Geithner told a congressionally appointed oversight panel this week that America's banks are still broken, despite all their bailout billions. And an inspector general assigned to the bailout program concluded this week that a private-public partnership designed to buy up bad assets is tilted in favor of private investors and creates "potential unfairness to the taxpayer." [link]

So everything is still broke, money has been created out of thin air, the size of the federal government has doubled in size in less than 100 days, and all this is supposed to be good and bring about "change" and "hope".

Family Farms Are Losers In The Stimulus Pork Barrel

"...resident Obama's stimulus bill will be, on balance, a series of disincentives for family farms to run the risks of aggressive farming, because the stimulus bill unfavorably raises the risk / reward ratio...Moreover, farm families work long, hard hours all year long to build and to preserve their farms for future generations of their families. Reinstatement of punitive death taxes, as proposed in the President's budget, is a meaningful disincentive to all that hard work." [link]

Does it amaze you as much as it does me that the administration wants to hand certain people things (welfare type benefits) hand over fist, yet people that produce on their own, and for others keep getting penalized? What type of logic is this? If anyone can explain please do, I just cannot manage to get my head around this idea. I speak from experience on this as well. I grew up and still live in a small rural community and my family owned and ran a small farm. The government effectively punishes anyone who does this to try and make the least profit or supplement their income in any way by these means.

Tea Party's Taking Shape

"Critics of President Barack Obama's stimulus plan gathered beneath the Arch Friday to cheer speeches over a bullhorn and toss tea into the Mississippi River...leaders said they had stolen a page from liberal tradition by taking to the streets with homemade signs...got the idea after Rick Santelli, a CNBC market commentator in Chicago, last week called for a tea party to protest Obama's anti-recession plan. Santelli's comments became a YouTube hit, and similar "tea parties" were planned in other cities." [link]

Don't you just love freedom of speech. I wonder how long it will be before we start seeing someone start trying to enact legislation to make this type of protest illegal or highly regulated, not counting the so called "Fairness Doctrine". Also gotta love the way freedom lovers are starting to use tactics used by liberosociofascist for years against them.

How About We Call You On It, Mr Obama!

"If a federal agency proposes a project that will waste that money, I will not hesitate to call them out on it and put a stop to it," Obama told the mayors, who were gathered in the White House. "And I want everybody here to be on notice ... if a local government does the same. I will call them out on it and use the full power of my office and our administration to stop it." [link]

Wonderful rhetoric in this instance, let's sound tough, but not mean a damn thing about it. If you truly are going to call out federal agencies for wasting money how about actually taking a look at some of the measures in your so called "stimulus law":

$24 million for USDA buildings and rent
$176 million for renovating Agricultural Research Service buildings
$290 million for flood prevention activities
$50 million for watershed rehabilitation
$1.4 billion for wastewater disposal programs
$295 million for administrative expenses associated with food stamp program
$1 billion for the 2010 Census
$200 million for public computer centers at community colleges and libraries
$650 million for the DTV converter box coupon program
$360 million for construction of NIST buildings
$830 million for NOAA research and facilities
$2 billion for Byrne JAG program
$10 million to combat Mexican gunrunners
$125 million for rural communities to combat drug crimes
$1 billion for the COPS program
$1 billion for NASA
$300 million to purchase scientific instruments for colleges and museums
$400 million for equipment and facilities at the NSF
$3.7 billion to conduct "green" renovations on military bases
$375 million for Mississippi River projects
$10 million for urban canals
$5 billion for weatherizing buildings
$2 billion to develop advanced batteries for hybrid cars
$3.4 billion for fossil energy research (possibly including an earmark for FutureGen)
$5.1 billion for environmental cleanup around military bases
$5.5 billion for "green" federal buildings
$300 million for "green" cars for federal employees
$20 million for IT upgrades at the Small Business Administration
$200 million to design and furnish DHS headquarters
$98 million earmark for a polar icebreaker
$210 million for State and local fire stations
$125 million to restore trails and abandoned mines
$146 million for trail maintenance at National Park Service sites
$140 million for volcano monitoring systems
$600 million for the EPA Superfund environmental cleanup program
$200 million to clean up leaking underground storage tanks
$500 million for forest health and wildfire prevention
$25 million for the Smithsonian Institution
$50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts
$1.2 billion for "youth activities" (for "youth" up to 24 years old)
$500 million earmark for NIH facilities in Bethesda, MD
$1 billion for Head Start
$32 million for home-delivered nutrition services
$160 million for volunteer programs at the Corporation for National and Community Service
$500 million earmark for the SSA National Computer Center in MD
$220 million for the International Boundary and Water Commission, U.S. and Mexico
$8 billion for high-speed railway (including an earmark for Harry Reid's LA to Las Vegas MagLev)
$1.3 billion for Amtrak

[link for source] & here

Obama's Rhetoric Is the Real 'Catastrophe'

"President Barack Obama has turned fearmongering into an art form...This fearmongering may be good politics, but it is bad history and bad economics. It is bad history because our current economic woes don't come close to those of the 1930s. At worst, a comparison to the 1981-82 recession might be appropriate. Consider the job losses that Mr. Obama always cites. In the last year, the U.S. economy shed 3.4 million jobs. That's a grim statistic for sure, but represents just 2.2% of the labor force. From November 1981 to October 1982, 2.4 million jobs were lost -- fewer in number than today, but the labor force was smaller. So 1981-82 job losses totaled 2.2% of the labor force, the same as now." [link]

I might also like to point out that Obama loves to compare himself with FDR, as far as being able to handle the recession that we are end and bring it to a close. In fact Obama is following almost the exact "strategy" that FDR did, that is to say massive government spending, creating jobs via infrastructure projects (WPA), and provide welfare benefits to the poor.

More opinions on what this "stimulus" will do for welfare reform can be found here.

You may also read an interesting paper on whether the New Deal helped or not here. Interestingly enough this article cites and gives a link to a paper by Christina Romer (heard of her, she is Obama's chairperson on the Council of Economic Adviser's), who in this paper give empirical evidence that government spending did not in any way help end the depression. However now that she has a top spot in the administration she is all for government spending.

Just read all the information contained here and enjoy.

Putting Things in Perspective: The Stimulus

Since the so called stimulus plan has passed, and will more than likely be signed into law early next week I thought I might take a bit of time to place the price of this in perspective. The face cost of the bill is in the league of $787 billion dollars, for some math purposes I will be using in a moment that is 787 followed by nine (9) zeros. (For those of you that may be reading this from other countries all amount are in US dollars. You may convert into your countries currency here).

Let us now presuppose that $100,000 US dollars. Is an amount that if earned annually would be more than sufficient to meet every need of an individual and take care of nearly every want. It is helpful to remember here that $50,233 was the average household income in America in 2008. So what I did was double then round off.

Now to get an impression of just how big this package really is. If an individual now spent exactly $1ooK a day it would take him/her 10 days to spend $1million. So every 100 days would be $10 million spent, 1000 days $100million, 10,000 days now gets us to $1billion dollars spent. This means it would take 27.4 years at a rate of $100K a day to equal $1billion dollars so at that rate it would take just a little over 21,536 YEARS to equal $787billion.

Even if we assume an expenditure rate of $100million a day it would take 10 days to get a $1billion, 100 for $10billion...for a grand total of 7870 days or 21.56 years at a rate of $100million a day to equal the size and scope of the stimulus.

Politicians Lie Again

"In a press conference Thursday, the House Republican leadership spoke candidly about being kept out of the House-Senate conference on the Obama-Pelosi-Reid so-called “economic stimulus” bill. They confirmed they had not yet seen the text of the bill as of 4 p.m...“The American people have a right to know what’s in this bill,” Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind) told HUMAN EVENTS after the press conference. “Every member of Congress -- Republicans and Democrats -- voted to post this bill on the internet for 48 hours, 48 hours ago. We’ll see if the Democrats keep their word.”Actually -- as of 5:15 pm, the Democrats had broken their word. The stimulus bill -- which we still haven’t seen -- will be released late tonight and will be brought up on the House floor at 9 am tomorrow." [link]

I was just wondering if everyone else finds the so called "transparency in government" as ironic and humorous as I do. Anymore I do not know whether to laugh or cry at the idiocy that goes on in D.C.