(1) Pretty Good

Senator Jon Kyl emphatically denies that we have much of an economic crisis on our hands. He thinks President Obama is just being careless with dangerous rhetoric when he describes it as a crisis that could escalate into a catastrophe.

In his weekly radio and Internet address on Saturday, the president praised the Senate deal and urged quick passage of a final bill.

“The time for action is now,” Mr. Obama said. “If we don’t move swiftly to put this plan in motion, our economic crisis could become a national catastrophe.”
[...]
“In discussing with the American people his approach to the stimulus of our economy, he has first really used some dangerous words,” said Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona, the No. 2 Republican. Mr. Kyl added, “It seems to me that the president is rather casually throwing out some careless language.”

(2) Even Better

Another Republican senator. Same sentiment, stronger language. This time it’s Barney Frank who’s fear-mongering:

But the other thing, to get back to what Congressman Frank said, is that, you know, we’re going to be laying off teachers and firefighters. You know, that’s just fearmongering. We’re not going to be doing that in any of the states. The states have grown, in their budgets, faster than population growth, faster than inflation for the last several year–actually, probably about the last 15 years. Their budgets are bloated, the federal government’s budget is bloated. What we should be doing is cutting back.

That’s John Ensign. Senator for the great state of Nevada. That happens to be the state facing the biggest budget shortfall in the nation. A shortfall of 38%. Kind of hard for ordinary mortals to see how they can cut the state budget by 38% without laying off not just teachers and firefighters, but a whole bunch of other people too. But senators from Nevada seem to have a whole different kind of vision.

(3) Best of Show

On Sunday on ABC‘s This Week, RNC chairman Michael Steele continued to defend his much-mocked statement that government has never created one single job

This time he argued that:
a) the unemployment rate in the U.S. is really 100%
b) there is absolutely nothing anyone can everdo to reduce it.

Here he is, patiently explaining to George Stephanopoulos that all of us who think we have jobs are living in a fool’s paradise. We only have work. The distinction, according to Steele, seems to be that if a job is not guaranteed to continue indefinitely, it’s only work and not a job. So government spending creates a contract which only creates work and not a job, because the contract doesn’t continue indefinitely. By the same token, any employment activity from which you can be laid off or fired doesn’t qualify as a job. (Steele offers some kind of denial of that last statement. It makes about as much sense as the rest of his “argument”.)

STEELE: What this administration is talking about is making work. It is creating work.

STEPHANOPOULOS: But that’s a job.

STEELE: No, it’s not a job. A job is something that — that a business owner creates. It’s going to be long term. What he’s creating…

STEPHANOPOULOS: So a job doesn’t count if it’s a government job?

(CROSSTALK)

STEELE: Hold on. No, let me — let me — let me finish. That is a contract. It ends at a certain point, George. You know that. These road projects that we’re talking about have an end point.

[...] It’s a whole different perspective on how you create a job versus how you create work. And I’m — either way, the bottom line is…

STEPHANOPOULOS: I guess I don’t really understand that distinction.

STEELE: Well, the difference — the distinction is this. If a government — if you’ve got a government contract that is a fixed period of time, it goes away. The work may go away. That’s — there’s no guarantee that that — that there’s going to be more work when you’re done in that job.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Yes, but we’ve seen millions and millions of jobs going away in the private sector just in the last year.

STEELE: But they come — yes, they — and they come back, though, George.

This reincarnation theory of private sector jobs, of course, works only if you firmly deny that businesses ever fail and shut down for good. (Unless Steele also has a reincarnation theory of failed businesses that he just hasn’t shared with us yet?)