Unclear on the Concept

Presidential edition:

Challenged by one Republican senator over the contents of the package, the new president, according to participants, replied: “I won.”

It’s nice to hear Obama acknowledging the fact that he did win an election in which he, a nominal Democrat, handily beat an insane Republican. What I can’t figure out is this: Democrats control the White House and both houses of Congress by wide margins. The only hurdle to near-dictatorial rule is getting one Republican in the Senate to reject a filibuster, and considering the number of endangered Republican Senators, this shouldn’t be hard, especially on the stimulus. So if Obama understands that he won, and that his nominal party also won, why does the “stimulus” contain $300 billion in tax cuts tax cuts already? These kind of tax cuts didn’t work in 2002, didn’t work in 2008, and will be even less effective in 2009. Obama’s desire for 80 votes in the Senate is indulgent at best, reckless at worst.

Comments

Phillip B. Roberts says:

January 23, 2009 at 8:56 pm

What makes you think the tax cuts didn’t work in 2002 or 2008? Quite honestly, with out those tax cuts, the economy might be in much worse shape than it is today. Also, my employers have already made me take a pay cut, what makes you think if they get taxes more my pay cuts won’t be higher, their products won’t get more expensive, and lay offs won’t be more than they already are?

What you need to look at is why it is the democrats passed into law, law’s which lowered regulations on the mortgage industry thereby allowing the sale of subprime loans to the public as class AAA loans, when in reality they were made up of multiple high risk and medium to high risk loans.
matt says:

January 23, 2009 at 9:14 pm

atrocious grammar, bad facts, misstating my premise.

that’s excellent work phil!

people saved as much as 80% of the 2008 stimulus checks. no one is suggesting tax hikes. spending the stimulus on infrastructure is the surest way to get any benefit from it.