President Barack Obama’s economic stimulus plan makes it through the houses of Congress.
Nathan Hartmann
– Staff Writer –
There will be no goose for Tiny Tim this Christmas, but there will be plenty of pork if President Barack Obama’s economic stimulus plan makes it through the houses of Congress.
As it stands, Obama’s now $900 billion plus stimulus bill is being roasted by senate republicans and few democrats, despite receiving a free pass by the House of Representatives without any Republican votes, and 11 Democrats as well.
Lead by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, the House democrats tacked on pounds of pork, making it untouchable by senate Republicans. Despite telling the nation that he was against pork or earmarks throughout his campaign, Obama hasn’t kept the pig pen closed, letting Pelosi run free adding on millions of dollars of pork projects to the stimulus.
Projects such as 246 million for Hollywood to spend on films, and 1.2 billion for “Youth Activities” for children. If you think the public school system is bad, wait for the massive government funded
Youth summer camps, an idea that went well in the 1930s, although not in America.
The stimulus bill in the Senate has now been changed, with most pork projects being shaved off by a combined effort of democrats and republicans, although it was hardly a bipartisan effort.
The bill has gone back to house after a 61-37 vote, where hopefully Nancy will keep her grubby nose out of it. Judging by her past actions, this may not happen, wasting time and delaying the action that President Obama has called for.
All of this does not change the fact that the bill is entirely wrong. At just over $800 billion now, it is still a huge waste of money. $600 billion has already been handed over to the rich and immoral bankers that partly caused the economic downfall; add the stimulus to it and you get a massive bill that the American people have to foot in the short, middle, and long run, as they always have.
This is supposed to be a time for change, a time for hope, what the country voted for. Instead the stimulus is more of the same, with politicians hoping to get the country back to where it was before the Iraq war started, or even just a year and a half ago when the economy was in decent shape.
These bailouts and stimulus bills lead to no real change; just a return to the same.
The government offers up millions to people in Hollywood, while high school teachers, the foundation of education, scrape by with under $40,000 a year. The rich get richer, the poor stay poor, and middle class toils away at their sometimes miserable jobs the rest of their lives.
Although a few may catch and break and move up in life to the glorious upper one percent, what honest middle class citizen wants to rub shoulders with the scum that brought us this mess in the first place, or the politicians that will do nothing to change it?
