"A failure to act and act now will turn crisis into a catastrophe" -- Robert Munn on this fucking list just a couple months ago.
Hope over fear? That's a partisan hack job of the lowest denominator. You sounded the alarm and you were right. You got me to agree with you even. It is a crisis, it is a catastrophe, it requires immediate and total attention and action. I was dubious at first but you were right. Don't fuck it up by being a douche about it now that the other side is saying it. Judah On Fri, Feb 6, 2009 at 5:42 PM, Robert Munn <[email protected]> wrote: > > * > http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/05/AR2009020502766_pf.html > * > > > *"A failure to act, and act now, will turn crisis into a catastrophe.*" > > *-- President Obama, Feb. 4*. > > Catastrophe, mind you. So much for the president who in his inaugural > address two weeks earlier declared "we have chosen hope over fear." Until, > that is, you need fear to pass a bill. > > And so much for the promise to banish the money changers and influence > peddlers from the temple. An ostentatious executive order banning lobbyists > was immediately followed by the nomination of at least a dozen current or > former lobbyists to high position. Followed by a Treasury secretary who > allegedly couldn't understand the payroll tax provisions in his 1040. > Followed by Tom Daschle, who had to fall on his sword according to the new > Washington rule that no Cabinet can have more than one tax delinquent. > > The Daschle affair was more serious because his offense involved more than > taxes. As Michael Kinsley once observed, in Washington the real scandal > isn't what's illegal, but what's legal. Not paying taxes is one thing. But > what made this case intolerable was the perfectly legal dealings that > amassed Daschle $5.2 million in just two years. > > He'd been getting $1 million per year from a law firm. But he's not a > lawyer, nor a registered lobbyist. You don't get paid this kind of money to > instruct partners on the Senate markup process. You get it for picking up > the phone and peddling influence. > > At least Tim Geithner, the tax-challenged Treasury secretary, had been > working for years as a humble international civil servant earning > non-stratospheric wages. Daschle, who had made another cool million a year > (plus chauffeur and Caddy) for unspecified services to a pal's private > equity firm, represented everything Obama said he'd come to Washington to > upend. > > And yet more damaging to Obama's image than all the hypocrisies in the > appointment process is his signature bill: the stimulus package. He > inexplicably delegated the writing to Nancy Pelosi and the barons of the > House. The product, which inevitably carries Obama's name, was not just bad, > not just flawed, but a legislative abomination. > > It's not just pages and pages of special-interest tax breaks, giveaways and > protections, one of which would set off a ruinous Smoot-Hawley trade war. > It's not just the waste, such as the $88.6 million for new construction for > Milwaukee Public Schools, which, reports the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, > have shrinking enrollment, 15 vacant schools and, quite logically, no plans > for new construction. > > It's the essential fraud of rushing through a bill in which the normal rules > (committee hearings, finding revenue to pay for the programs) are suspended > on the grounds that a national emergency requires an immediate job-creating > stimulus -- and then throwing into it hundreds of billions that have nothing > to do with stimulus, that Congress's own budget office says won't be spent > until 2011 and beyond, and that are little more than the back-scratching, > special-interest, lobby-driven parochialism that Obama came to Washington to > abolish. He said. > > Not just to abolish but to create something new -- a new politics where the > moneyed pork-barreling and corrupt logrolling of the past would give way to > a bottom-up, grass-roots participatory democracy. That is what made Obama so > dazzling and new. Turns out the "fierce urgency of now" includes $150 > million for livestock (and honeybee and farm-raised fish) insurance. > > The Age of Obama begins with perhaps the greatest frenzy of old-politics > influence peddling ever seen in Washington. By the time the stimulus bill > reached the Senate, reports the Wall Street Journal, pharmaceutical and > high-tech companies were lobbying furiously for a new plan to repatriate > overseas profits that would yield major tax savings. California wine growers > and Florida citrus producers were fighting to change a single phrase in one > provision. Substituting "planted" for "ready to market" would mean a > windfall garnered from a new "bonus depreciation" incentive. > > After Obama's miraculous 2008 presidential campaign, it was clear that at > some point the magical mystery tour would have to end. The nation would rub > its eyes and begin to emerge from its reverie. The hallucinatory Obama would > give way to the mere mortal. The great ethical transformations promised > would be seen as a fairy tale that all presidents tell -- and that this > president told better than anyone. > > I thought the awakening would take six months. It took two and a half weeks. > > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:287646 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
