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Stimulus: Republicans Look To Capitalize On Democrats' Mistakes
'A Bad Beginning'
By Joe Murray, The Bulletin
As House Speaker Nancy Pelosi rushed to begin her European vacation and Barack Obama prepared to wine and dine the first lady in Chicago this Valentine’s weekend, Congress — over Republican objections — was told it had to vote on a stimulus its members had not had time to read.
The economic was crisis was so severe, the argument went, any time wasted could make recovery that more difficult. But as soon as the massive $787-billion bill passed the House Friday, the urgency that marked the stimulus debate went on vacation along with Mr. Obama and Ms. Pelosi.
Rather than sign the bill immediately, Mr. Obama returned home to Chicago where he and Mrs. Obama dined Saturday at the posh Table Fifty-Two restaurant. The signing of the once urgent bill was to be put off until tomorrow when Mr. Obama, refreshed from his three-day weekend, would travel to Denver to sign the bill.
Democrats declared victory, and commentators declared the passage of the stimulus marked the most successful First 100 days in history. But the reality of the fact the stimulus repealed the 1996 welfare reforms, expanded government control of health care and discriminated against students of faith on campus is setting in. Now Republicans are hoping that voters, who witnessed Mr. Obama’s failure to be bipartisan as he had promised, will soon experience buyers’ remorse.
“Democrats have been in charge of Washington for just a few weeks, but their record so far is disappointing to voters who hoped for change,” said RNC Chairman Michael Steele.
“It’s disappointing that President Obama allowed a 1,000-plus page bill to be written in secret and voted on hours later before members of Congress — let alone the American people — had time to review it. This is not the transparency President Obama promised when he said bills would be posted online for five days.”
Republicans shocked Democrats when GOP lawmakers in the House united to oppose the bill and Senate Republicans, minus three left-leaning defectors, sought to stop the bill cold in its tracks. The Republican campaign to shine the light on the stimulus caused the public to question its wisdom. It also brought into the public eye a number of controversial measures Democrats had sneaked into legislation ostensibly intended to stimulate the ailing economy.
Rejecting the bipartisan welfare reform enacted into law by former President Bill Clinton and congressional Republicans, the stimulus now rewards states with bonuses when they increase their welfare rolls.
In terms of health care, the stimulus provides $1.1 billion to fund “Comparative Effectiveness Research.” In nations with universal health care, such research attempts to create the best means of rationing health care, especially among the elderly.
Republicans have been witnessing an early return to relevancy due to how the Democrats have structured the legislation, which had initially been intended to revamp the nation’s ailing infrastructure.
Instead, it morphed into a massive spending bill that earmarks millions of dollars for projects such as a high-speed train connecting Majority Leader Harry Reid’s Las Vegas with Los Angeles, and it only allocates 3 percent of the $787 billion stimulus for highway construction — or $27.5 billion.
“The silver lining in this whole debate is that Americans are now finding out what the true stakes are in Washington: it’s a battle between government control over our lives or the freedom that made America great,” said U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C. “Freedom isn’t an ideology — it works. Freedom is the only thing that has ever worked and I will continue fighting for it.”
The Democratic partisanship involved with the passage of the stimulus has left Mr. Obama vulnerable to charges of hypocrisy and inexperience.
“It was a bad beginning,” U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Mr. Obama’s former rival, told CNN Sunday when asked about the stimulus bill. “It was a bad beginning because it wasn’t what we promised the American people, what President Obama promised the American people — that we would sit down together.”
It was the promise of change, specifically bi-partisanship that caused a number of voters to flock to the hopeful message of the young president. But no sooner did Mr. Obama take the oath of office, he handed the stimulus debate over to Mrs. Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and did little, if nothing, to circumvent the partisan nature of the debate.
“If this is going to be bipartisanship, the country’s screwed,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, told ABC’s “This Week.” “I know bipartisanship when I see it.
“This is not ‘Change We Can Believe In.’”
And while Republicans contend Mr. Obama’s first major attempt at bipartisanship was a failure, the president’s inability to control the liberal wing of his party created an opening for Republican policies to regain legitimacy in popular consciousness.
“If government spending created jobs and prosperity, we’d have the best economy in our history right now. But government-controlled economies have never worked and never will, as we learned painfully in the Great Depression and Japan proved in their ‘Lost Decade,’” Mr. DeMint said.
Joe Murray can be reached at jmurray@thebulletin.us
The economic was crisis was so severe, the argument went, any time wasted could make recovery that more difficult. But as soon as the massive $787-billion bill passed the House Friday, the urgency that marked the stimulus debate went on vacation along with Mr. Obama and Ms. Pelosi.
Rather than sign the bill immediately, Mr. Obama returned home to Chicago where he and Mrs. Obama dined Saturday at the posh Table Fifty-Two restaurant. The signing of the once urgent bill was to be put off until tomorrow when Mr. Obama, refreshed from his three-day weekend, would travel to Denver to sign the bill.
Democrats declared victory, and commentators declared the passage of the stimulus marked the most successful First 100 days in history. But the reality of the fact the stimulus repealed the 1996 welfare reforms, expanded government control of health care and discriminated against students of faith on campus is setting in. Now Republicans are hoping that voters, who witnessed Mr. Obama’s failure to be bipartisan as he had promised, will soon experience buyers’ remorse.
“Democrats have been in charge of Washington for just a few weeks, but their record so far is disappointing to voters who hoped for change,” said RNC Chairman Michael Steele.
“It’s disappointing that President Obama allowed a 1,000-plus page bill to be written in secret and voted on hours later before members of Congress — let alone the American people — had time to review it. This is not the transparency President Obama promised when he said bills would be posted online for five days.”
Republicans shocked Democrats when GOP lawmakers in the House united to oppose the bill and Senate Republicans, minus three left-leaning defectors, sought to stop the bill cold in its tracks. The Republican campaign to shine the light on the stimulus caused the public to question its wisdom. It also brought into the public eye a number of controversial measures Democrats had sneaked into legislation ostensibly intended to stimulate the ailing economy.
Rejecting the bipartisan welfare reform enacted into law by former President Bill Clinton and congressional Republicans, the stimulus now rewards states with bonuses when they increase their welfare rolls.
In terms of health care, the stimulus provides $1.1 billion to fund “Comparative Effectiveness Research.” In nations with universal health care, such research attempts to create the best means of rationing health care, especially among the elderly.
Republicans have been witnessing an early return to relevancy due to how the Democrats have structured the legislation, which had initially been intended to revamp the nation’s ailing infrastructure.
Instead, it morphed into a massive spending bill that earmarks millions of dollars for projects such as a high-speed train connecting Majority Leader Harry Reid’s Las Vegas with Los Angeles, and it only allocates 3 percent of the $787 billion stimulus for highway construction — or $27.5 billion.
“The silver lining in this whole debate is that Americans are now finding out what the true stakes are in Washington: it’s a battle between government control over our lives or the freedom that made America great,” said U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C. “Freedom isn’t an ideology — it works. Freedom is the only thing that has ever worked and I will continue fighting for it.”
The Democratic partisanship involved with the passage of the stimulus has left Mr. Obama vulnerable to charges of hypocrisy and inexperience.
“It was a bad beginning,” U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Mr. Obama’s former rival, told CNN Sunday when asked about the stimulus bill. “It was a bad beginning because it wasn’t what we promised the American people, what President Obama promised the American people — that we would sit down together.”
It was the promise of change, specifically bi-partisanship that caused a number of voters to flock to the hopeful message of the young president. But no sooner did Mr. Obama take the oath of office, he handed the stimulus debate over to Mrs. Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and did little, if nothing, to circumvent the partisan nature of the debate.
“If this is going to be bipartisanship, the country’s screwed,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, told ABC’s “This Week.” “I know bipartisanship when I see it.
“This is not ‘Change We Can Believe In.’”
And while Republicans contend Mr. Obama’s first major attempt at bipartisanship was a failure, the president’s inability to control the liberal wing of his party created an opening for Republican policies to regain legitimacy in popular consciousness.
“If government spending created jobs and prosperity, we’d have the best economy in our history right now. But government-controlled economies have never worked and never will, as we learned painfully in the Great Depression and Japan proved in their ‘Lost Decade,’” Mr. DeMint said.
Joe Murray can be reached at jmurray@thebulletin.us
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