fastest that a bill this size has ever gotten through congress.

We are talking $900 billion in basically two weeks. I mean these people have not even moved into their offices. It is nothing short of amazing. Cloture is on Sunday, which basically means put up or shut up. Repubs have indicated there is not going to be a filibuster, and then the vote and it goes through.

^{“Is not our first thought to go on the road? The road is our source, our vault of treasures, our wealth. Only on the road does the ‘traveller’ feel like himself, at home.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski}

And the fire fighters throw a heavy rope at you, hitting you hard on the face, what do you do? Do you bitch about their imperfect rescue attempt? Dunno. Nobody knows right now. Everybody just bitches, totally understandable. :)

is that the firefighters throw the rope to the floor below yours, expecting that it's good enough to help you. And yes, you bitch at them because they don't rescue you but leave you to the flames.

That's the difference in perspectives here--rather than being an imperfect rescue, it's simply not a rescue at all.

NOT bailing out industries such as the automobile companies and insolvent banks, much like what Ron Paul advocated for and for which I got verbally assaulted a few days ago.

Stimulus can work but it had best be applied with care and foresight. Why build new roads if the fuel to power cars will not be there or will be so expensive we can't afford to buy it?

In that case we need to be thinking of light rail and mass transit.

Why make more cars when the industry is overproducing cars by 3,000,000 units a year as is?

And for damn sure, why keep giving money to companies that in the midst of losing their asses insist on rewarding upper management with huge bonuses on taxpayer expense?

We need desperately to scale back military spending, the war on drugs, etc. That will mean job losses--temporary hardship on a level none of us have seen, but also the possibility that we can retool and survive.

Trying to keep the dinosaur alive will kill all of us.

I did inhale.

Here's a quote from the article you linked:

"These distortions cannot happen without active government involvement. Without allowing willfully false statements on 1003s (mortgage documents) you cannot grant $500,000 loans to people who make $8/hour. It simply can't happen, because the inherent risk of default on those loans is so high that absent fraud nobody in their right mind will fund those loans and honest regulators will step in and stop the stupidity before it can get out of hand."

This is pure dogma and intellectual dishonesty, unless by "government involvement", you mean simply the basic rule of law necessary to have a market - then, yes, market abuses can only happen with government involvement because a market (beyond a very primitive level) can only happen with government involvement, but that's not what he's trying to say, and what he is trying to say is false. The government did not require lenders to give out mortgages to those who could not afford them. The government did not require fraud or lack of due diligence, nor are those things "impossible without government involvement" as history shows very clearly. Why should anyone take this clown seriously?

Greenspan, in order to save bush from the embarrassment of a recession in the first year of his term did juice the market and did encourage lending to unqualified borrowers with the belief they'd be able to pay simply because housing would continue to gain in value.

It did, until it didn't.

I did inhale.

If he had said that Greenspan's loose monetary policy and advocacy of "innovative" home financing had been contributing factors to the mess, I would have had no objection. What he said is that credit crises can only occur with active government involvement. That is clearly false historically, and in the present case, the government's sins were chiefly those of omission cheered on by those, like him, who see government at the root of all economic ills, facts be damned.

When millions are unemployed.

As clever as tax cuts in the stimulus package. Tax cuts presuppose profits, profits are looking bad and the outlook is worse.

luxury items. And raising taxes in general is not something you want to do in a recession. We've got no good options now, only bad and less bad.

^{“Is not our first thought to go on the road? The road is our source, our vault of treasures, our wealth. Only on the road does the ‘traveller’ feel like himself, at home.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski}

eom

This is all about political posturing.

But in the view of many Obama gave up too much for too little. As Krugman says in his column today, cited by SPK above, this bill risks being too little, too late to avoid being caught in a deflationary spiral. But it's better than the GOP non-alternative, which would do essentially nothing.

is textbook. The results of stimulus depending on the scope of the bill is utterly measurable. Geithner has dealt with economic collapses since the mid 1990's - Russia, Asia, Brazil, Mexico.

Our efforts have kept the dollar on a rising trend which helps, that means a level of confidence continues. Our ability to move quickly is still refreshing, and there have been market upside surprises for the first time in months. Upside surprises in retail and in the service sector, and a much higher productivity number than expected. Market has tested bottoms three times now and still holds above 8000, all good signs.

I am still on record that the meme next year at this time will be, Did We Stimulate the Economy too Much??

I simply disagree with the text book. The "Bubbles" of the 90's were nothing like this. For the fun and challenge of it, I'll go on record with " Shit, that didn't work".

Geithner was the man for the job tho. When the tax thingy came up I was thankful nobody gave a crap when Einstein wanted in. Morons.

http://www.speaker.gov/img/jobsrecessions.jpg

That curve has not begun to turn. And employment is a lagging indicator.

I agree.

From what I can tell, there'll be 51 Republicans to 49 Democrats (or visa-versa) that qualify.

Tom Daschle didn't get disqualified for being a liberal--he got disqualified for being a tax cheat.

Bill Richardson (who I admire and supported) also is facing potential ethics violations.

Pelosi, Reid?

We all know what bush and Cheney were.

Bankers, Wall Street professionals, people in government from the highest offices to local county commissioners have stolen from and violated the people they serve for personal gain.

Politicians don't get tough with others for fear of exposing their own sins.

The drought oustside my door looks like paradise when compared to the landscape in our nation's capitol.

Obama may be the brightest spot of the bunch.

I did inhale.

By "tougher" I meant that he needs to act like a President in the middle of an emergency. Figure out what needs to be done, then use the bully pulpit to sell the idea to the citizenry. Not enough of that has been done so far, and it's weakened him.

Of course, he may be doing just what's expected of him by his real constituency, but it's going to leave the country in really sad shape.

Putting people in jail would be a great parallel step.