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OK. Whatever you say, champ. 
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I know. Arithmetic is hard.
"Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than before. He is full of murderous resentment of people who are ignorant without having come by their ignorance the hard way. "
-BokononComment
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I was just trolling anyway. I'll leave all that reading up to beancounters like yourself.Originally posted by Naked Gents Rut View Post
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HURRY, FELLAS, LET'S VOTE, I AM OFF TO ROME!
Fri Feb 13 2009 09:18:52 ET
Rep. John Culberson, TX claims the "stimulus" bill must be urgently voted on today -- because Speaker Nancy Pelosi is leaving at 6:00 PM for an 8 day trip to Europe!
Culberson made the charge on Houston's KSEV radio.
Pelosi is hoping to lead a delegation to Europe; there's a meeting with the Pope and an award from an Italian legislative group.
Calls to Pelosi's spokesman went unreturned.
In the rushing, Democrats have now broken their promise to have the public see the $790 billion bill for 48 hours before any vote.
Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) predicted that none of his Senate colleagues would 'have the chance' to read the entire final version of the 1,071-page bill before it comes up for a final vote.
Developing...
Would it be alright to call our congressmen and ask to please at least read the damn thing before they vote on it? I know Pelosi is itching to meet the Pope and all, but it seems this might be a little more important.No, I did not steal that from somebody on Something Awful.Comment
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Democrats Delay Bill Release to Conceal Details
by Connie Hair
02/13/2009
Democratic staffers released the final version of the stimulus bill at about 11 p.m. last night after delaying the release for hours to put it into a format which people cannot “search” on their home computers.
Instead of publishing the bill as a regular internet document -- which people can search by “key words” and otherwise, the Dems took hours to convert the final bill from the regular searchable format into “pdf” files, which can be read but not searched.
Three of the four .pdf files had no text embedded, just images of the text, which did not permit text searches of the bill. That move to conceal the bill’s provisions had not been remedied this morning at the time of publication of this article. (You can find the entire bill on the House Appropriations [http://appropriations.house.gov] website.)
So, what are they hiding? A lot.
We searched the bill randomly -- the only way possible -- to see what’s being hidden from the public and the members of Congress who will be voting on the bill today. We found one provision that may be a good example of why the Democrats are desperate to stop any exposure of what is in this bill. Like this gem:
SEC. 1607. (a) CERTIFICATION BY GOVERNOR -- Not later than 45 days after the date of enactment of this Act, for funds provided to any State or agency thereof, the Governor of the State shall certify that: 1) the State request and use funds provided by this Act , and; 2) funds be used to create jobs and promote economic growth.
(b) ACCEPTANCE BY STATE LEGISLATURE -- If funds provided to any State in any division of this Act are not accepted for use by the Governor, then acceptance by the State legislature, by means of the adoption of a concurrent resolution, shall be sufficient to provide funding to such State.
This provision --– apparently aimed at conservative governors such as South Carolina’s Mark Sanford who does not want the federal money -- would overturn state laws and constitutions, intervening directly in the state’s government to give the legislature the power to overturn a government’s decision.
This provision probably violates the US Constitution, a matter which will be of no concern to Congressional Democrats.
This act -- to strong-arm state governments and a governor’s ability to control the state budget -- is Chicago-style bipartisanship.
This bill is so bad that even the Associated Press analyst report today concludes that the bill will not jump-start the economy.
Scramble in the Senate
Roll Call is reporting that Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) will likely not be able to travel to Washington for the vote. This causes a conundrum for Reid, as it would bring the vote total down to 60 -- the number needed -- but no Republican wants to go on record as the 60th vote. Reid may try to get around Senate rules to enable Specter, Snowe and Collins to avoid being Vote #60 for the stimulus bill.
Connie Hair is a freelance writer, a former speechwriter for Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) and a former media and coalitions advisor to the Senate Republican Conference.No, I did not steal that from somebody on Something Awful.Comment
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Would it be alright to call our congressmen and ask to please at least read the damn thing before they vote on it?
-Arriangrog want tank...Grog Want Tank... GROG WANT TANK!
The trick isn't to break some eggs to make an omelette, it's convincing the eggs to break themselves in order to aspire to omelettehood.Comment
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Arithmetic is hard.
It apparently is for the Obama Administration.
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Congressional Offices Don't Have the Stimulus Bill, Lobbyists Do
February 12, 2009 04:14 PM ET | Paul Bedard | Permanent Link | Print
By Paul Bedard, Washington Whispers
We're receiving E-mails from Capitol Hill staffers expressing frustration that they can't get a copy of the stimulus bill agreed to last night at a price of $789 billion. What's more, staffers are complaining about who does have a copy: K Street lobbyists. E-mails one key Democratic staffer: "K Street has the bill, or chunks of it, already, and the congressional offices don't. So, the Hill is getting calls from the press (because it's leaking out) asking us to confirm or talk about what we know—but we can't do that because we haven't seen the bill. Anyway, peeps up here are sort of a combo of confused and like, 'Is this really happening?'" Reporters pressing for details, meanwhile, are getting different numbers from different offices, especially when seeking the details of specific programs.
Worse, there seem to be several different versions of what was agreed upon, with some officials circulating older versions of the package that seems to still be developing. Leadership aides said that it will work out later today and promised that lawmakers will get time to review the bill before Friday's vote.
Check out more of the new Washington Whispers.No, I did not steal that from somebody on Something Awful.Comment
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SURPRISE! Dems Break Promise: Stimulus Bill to Floor Friday
by Connie Hair
02/12/2009
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.
Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) said he was unsure how many Democrats would vote with Republicans again on this bill but that he thought Republicans “may get a few” Democrats to side with them. The fact that the Demos have now broken their promise to have the public able to see the bill for 48 hours may drive more Dems into the Republican camp.
“[I] don’t know, ‘cause they haven’t seen the bill either,” Boehner said.
“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.
The following statement was released by Majority Leader Steny Hoyer at 4:57 p.m.:
"The House is scheduled to meet at 9:00 a.m. tomorrow and is expected to proceed directly to consideration of the American Recovery and Reinvestment conference report. The conference report text will be filed this evening, giving members enough time to review the conference report before voting on it tomorrow afternoon."
Meanwhile, at an earlier presser Thursday, Pelosi -- while talking about legislation regarding school construction funds -- said it was vital to see the language of a bill before making decisions. ReadtheStimulus.org had the following quote:
“With all of this you have to see the language. You said this --- I said that --- I understood it to be this way --- you know, we wanted to see it in writing and when we did that then we were able to go forward."
"Around here language means a lot. Words weigh a ton and one person's understanding of a spoken description might vary from another's. We wanted to see it. And not only just I had to see it, I had to show it to my colleagues and my caucus. We wanted to take all the time that was necessary to make sure it was right."
Congressional members are also exchanging barbs via the popular social network Twitter. Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) twittered, "Don't know when we're going to vote. Will the no votes delay vote just because they can? Speed is important. They know that."
House Republican Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) twittered back, “Those in favor of speed over commonsense may just be afraid of letting the People know what they are ramming through.”
UPDATE: The Democrats finally made the bill's language available around 11 p.m. Thursday, approximately 10 hours before members meet Friday to consider the bill and 38 hours short of the time promised Americans to review the bill.No, I did not steal that from somebody on Something Awful.Comment
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Oh god, did anyone just want to reach up and ***** slap Pelosi during here little press conference?"The DPRK is still in a state of war with the U.S. It's called a black out." - Che explaining why orbital nightime pictures of NK show few lights. Seriously.Comment
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Decent NYT article on the lessons of the Japanese experience in the 90s.
We shouldn't be wasting all this money on an ineffective stimulus when we're going to need trillions to clean up the real problem in the financial sector, through nationalization if need be.Comment
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Although the two situations are similar in many ways they are different in one significant way, in that we are facing a world depression now, and the Japanese weren't then. Fixing the financial system isn't going to be enough to fix the world economy. Also, the article only says that the Japanese relied on stimulus instead of fixing the financial system. It doesn't have to be one or the other.Originally posted by Naked Gents Rut View PostDecent NYT article on the lessons of the Japanese experience in the 90s.
We shouldn't be wasting all this money on an ineffective stimulus when we're going to need trillions to clean up the real problem in the financial sector, through nationalization if need be.I drank beer. I like beer. I still like beer. ... Do you like beer Senator?
- Justice Brett KavanaughComment
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Fixing the financial system isn't going to be enough to fix the world economy.
Neither is an American stimulus package. Trying to boost American aggregate demand back to its pre-recession levels is just going to recreate the global imbalances that led to this crisis in the first place. And that's assuming the stimulus will actually work, which is looking more doubtful by the day.Comment
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Taking off some of the drag is about all that can be done I think anyway.Originally posted by Naked Gents Rut View PostI drank beer. I like beer. I still like beer. ... Do you like beer Senator?
- Justice Brett KavanaughComment
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