Bob Herbert:
Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa was blunt this week after he and other Senate
Democrats met with Obama aides to discuss the president-elect’s stimulus
package. “There is only one thing we have got to do in the stimulus, and
that is how can we create jobs,” he said.
Referring to Mr. Obama’s national economic adviser, Lawrence Summers,
Mr. Harkin added: “I am a little concerned by the way that Mr. Summers
and others are going at this in that, to me, it still looks like a
little more of this trickle down. If we just put it in at the top, it’s
going to trickle down.”
Been there. Done that. Didn’t work.
The madness of trickle down and its corollaries ruined the economy and
millions of Americans with it. President-elect Obama ran to the mantra
of change. One hopes he is not too timid to deliver.
full: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/10/opinion/10herbert.html
---
Gail Collins:
There are some things on which parties can work together very nicely.
For instance, it was very clear from the committee hearing that nobody
in the Senate supports childhood obesity and that Daschle, a popular
former majority leader, would be confirmed even if he had showed up to
testify in the nude. Maybe, if everybody in the House tries very hard to
get along, the chamber will not find it impossible to reach accord on a
resolution commemorating Mother’s Day, as happened last year.
But there are some things about which the two parties are supposed to
disagree. During the presidential campaign, Obama talked constantly
about creating a national health insurance program while John McCain
said the government should just give people tax breaks for buying their
own policies. Obama won, and the Democrats’ job now is to figure out how
to make sure the current economic crisis is solved in a way that allows
him to deliver on his promise to do something big and ambitious about
health care — and his other signature issue, energy/global warming. The
Republicans’ job is to try to limit the big spending to tax cuts and
short-term building projects. If the final bill passes by 80 or 90
votes, it’s probably going to be because it’s a watered-down mess.
Which is the sort of thing that nobody wants. Unless they live in a pot.
full: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/10/opinion/10collins.html
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