What got cut from the Stimulus Bill

[Warph]

What got cut from the Stimulus Bill

CNN - Updated 5:40 p.m. EST, Sat February 7, 2009 
A coalition of Democrats and some Republicans reached a compromise that trimmed billions in spending from an earlier version of the Senate economic stimulus bill. CNN obtained, from a Democratic leadership aide, a list of some programs that have been cut, either entirely or partially:
   

Partially cut:

• $3.5 billion for energy-efficient federal buildings (original bill $7 billion)

• $75 million from Smithsonian (original bill $150 million)

• $200 million from Environmental Protection Agency Superfund (original bill $800 million)

• $100 million from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (original bill $427 million)

• $100 million from law enforcement wireless (original bill $200 million)

• $300 million from federal fleet of hybrid vehicles (original bill $600 million)

• $100 million from FBI construction (original bill $400 million)

 

Fully eliminated

• $55 million for historic preservation

• $122 million for Coast Guard polar icebreaker/cutters

• $100 million for Farm Service Agency modernization

• $50 million for Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service

• $65 million for watershed rehabilitation

• $100 million for distance learning

• $98 million for school nutrition

• $50 million for aquaculture

• $2 billion for broadband

• $100 million for National Institute of Standards and Technology

• $50 million for detention trustee

• $25 million for Marshalls Construction

• $300 million for federal prisons

• $300 million for BYRNE Formula grant program

• $140 million for BYRNE Competitive grant program

• $10 million state and local law enforcement

• $50 million for NASA

• $50 million for aeronautics

• $50 million for exploration

• $50 million for Cross Agency Support

• $200 million for National Science Foundation

• $100 million for science

• $1 billion for Energy Loan Guarantees

• $4.5 billion for General Services Administration

• $89 million General Services Administration operations

• $50 million from Department of Homeland Security

• $200 million Transportation Security Administration

• $122 million for Coast Guard Cutters, modifies use

• $25 million for Fish and Wildlife

• $55 million for historic preservation

• $20 million for working capital fund

• $165 million for Forest Service capital improvement

• $90 million for State and Private Wildlife Fire Management

• $1 billion for Head Start/Early Start

• $5.8 billion for Health Prevention Activity

• $2 billion for Health Information Technology Grants

• $600 million for Title I (No Child Left Behind)

• $16 billion for school construction

• $3.5 billion for higher education construction

• $1.25 billion for project based rental

• $2.25 billion for Neighborhood Stabilization

• $1.2 billion for retrofitting Project 8 housing

• $40 billion for state fiscal stabilization (includes $7.5 billion of state incentive grants)

[Warph]

Of all the annoyances to come out of the financial crisis, this one takes the cake: French intellectuals are mocking us.  According to the Los Angeles Times rag, finance officials, regular Joes and leftist intellectuals within Europe have condemned the perceived breakdown of America's capitalistic system.

French intellectuals have been gloating about it.  They are making "gleeful allusions to the stock market crash of 1929."  They are expressing nostalgia for "the good old days when bankers jumped out of windows."  They are criticizing government plans to bail out U.S. corporate giants who otherwise loathe government.

But they have entirely misunderstood the cause of the problem.  America's capitalistic systems didn't fail.  Our government did.

You see, the money-lending business used to be rigid in America.  Bankers used to apply draconian measures: They demanded that applicants have jobs, decent credit histories and enough dough to make a down payment.

But some in our government felt such requirements were unfair.  Some 31 years ago, they passed the Community Reinvestment Act into law -- and turbocharged that law during the Clinton years.  It requires lenders to extend loans to folks who would not otherwise qualify.  In the meantime, another government entity -- the Federal Reserve -- pumped easy money into the economy.  Pretty soon, any old fool could get a loan.

And as every old fool did get a loan, the loans were packaged and happily sold to quasi-government organizations, such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.  The role of Fan and Fred was to buy up loans from lenders so the lenders can then lend more money to other home buyers.  But Fan and Fred started buying some loan packages that included "subprime" loans because they paid higher returns.  The higher returns allowed Fan and Fred to show higher profits (on paper, anyhow).  The higher profits allowed the government cronies who ran Fan and Fred to give themselves multimillion-dollar bonuses.

So long as the housing bubble was expanding -- and Fan and Fred regulators were kept at bay -- everyone was happy.  Folks invested in Fan and Fred, because, as quasi-government organizations, everybody figured the government would bail them out if they ever went belly up.

Fan and Fred did go belly up and taxpayers were forced to bail them out.

But the financial mess the government helped create is now so widespread, the only way to head off an even greater mess is more government intervention -- the borrowing of lots more taxpayer dough to keep the massive house of cards from collapsing.

Our government is just getting warmed up.

Negative economic news is benefiting the our new president.  The more people panic about the financial markets, the more people -- for reasons that make no sense to me -- think Obama's ideas will lead to better economic conditions.  But his ideas will lead to more government meddling.  He's promised to raise a variety of taxes, such as the capital gains tax, even though his increases will hurt investment and damage the economy.

He's promising billions in new spending with this "Stimulus bill" to fund all kinds of new programs, which will divert even more money from the private sector to the government sector -- and further slow the economy.  He's promising to apply similar government philosophies -- the same command-and-control meddling that has perverted our financial systems and led to the crisis we are in -- to "fix" health care, the environment and a host of other challenges.

So, my French intellectual friends, don't gloat over the demise of America's capitalistic system.  It is our government system that did most of the failing.  And government failure always begets more government.  Which ought to make you happy.  Where government intervention is concerned, America is becoming more like France every day.  If we keep it up, our economy will soon be as anemic as France's.  We'll soon have lots more unemployed folks sitting around cafes complaining about the failure of American capitalism.

[Catwoman]

Well written, Warph.  I don't think we're going to see a quick resolution to this financial mess that we're in...As a matter of fact, I think that it's going to take a number of years...Maybe even more than 5...Before we start to see things start to turn around.  I just don't see how our economy can bounce back quickly, even with the giant infusion from the feds.  I have never been a big supporter of regulation...But wouldn't some regulation in these areas have helped to avoid at least SOME of this mess?

[Catwoman]

By the way...Sounds like we all need to start clinging to our guns and our various religions about now, wouldn't you say?

[srkruzich]

Well written, Warph.  I don't think we're going to see a quick resolution to this financial mess that we're in...As a matter of fact, I think that it's going to take a number of years...Maybe even more than 5...Before we start to see things start to turn around.  I just don't see how our economy can bounce back quickly, even with the giant infusion from the feds.  I have never been a big supporter of regulation...But wouldn't some regulation in these areas have helped to avoid at least SOME of this mess?

Well it would bounce back in 2 years if and only if they let the businesses fail that are going to fail and allow the entrepenurial spirit of folks to start new businesses that will take the place of old ones. Secondly cut this damn government down to a CONSTITUTIONAL Government, where it is supposed to handle foreign affairs and leave domestic affairs to the states as per the 10th amendment. 

I like the fact that several states are declaring soverignty and telling the feds to kiss off.  That is a start. 

[Warph]

Cheer up, CatWoman.... Newsweek says "We Are All Socialists Now" in their latest edition. And just to make you feel better about losing the greatest experiement in liberty and personal freedom ever tried in the history of the world, Newsweek says, "we will become more like France."

aaaaah France.... with it's crashing GDP.  France.... with millions of workers taking to the streets in protest of reduced government goodies and shutting down not only the schools but all major services in France.  France.... where the infamous "youths" (read, illegals from Muslin nations) have made car burning into a national pasttime. France.... who can't even compete with Germany.... that's what we are going to be like?  Do you get the feeling that I do not like France?

And just in case you might be having a thought or two that Obama is not really working for the best of our nation in true Founding Father's style, look what he slipped in on us:

As reported on the Federal Register for February 4, 2009:

Presidential Determination No. 2009-15 of January 27, 2009

In this determination, Obama grabbed $20.3 million of your money for "migration and refugee" assistance to Gaza.  Not that we should hold it against the Gazans that they were dancing in the streets with joy on September 11, 2001.  Or that they put AK-47s in the hands of their young children teaching them to chant "Death To America, Death To Israel," in the terrorist syled parades.  We would never want to hold that against them, now would we.

Now, in keeping with the Migration and Refugee Assistance Act of 1962, designed to help Cubans fleeing Cuba to come here, we are going to help Palestinian terrorists come here??   http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/20...009/E9- 2488.htm

[Federal Register: February 4, 2009 (Volume 74, Number 22)]
[Presidential Documents]               
[Page 6115]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr04fe09-106]                         



                        Presidential Documents




[[Page 6115]]


                Presidential Determination No. 2009-15 of January 27,
                2009


                Unexpected Urgent Refugee and Migration Needs
                Related To Gaza

                Memorandum for the Secretary of State

                By the authority vested in me by the Constitution and
                the laws of the United States, including section
                2(c)(1) of the Migration and Refugee Assistance Act of
                1962 (the ``Act''), as amended (22 U.S.C. 2601), I
                hereby determine, pursuant to section 2(c)(1) of the
                Act, that it is important to the national interest to
                furnish assistance under the Act in an amount not to
                exceed $20.3 million from the United States Emergency
                Refugee and Migration Assistance Fund for the purpose
                of meeting unexpected and urgent refugee and migration
                needs, including by contributions to international,
                governmental, and nongovernmental organizations and
                payment of administrative expenses of Bureau of
                Population, Refugees, and Migration of the Department
                of State, related to humanitarian needs of Palestinian
                refugees and conflict victims in Gaza.

                You are authorized and directed to publish this
                memorandum in the Federal Register.
               
               
                    (Presidential Sig.)

                THE WHITE HOUSE,

                    Washington, January 27, 2009

[FR Doc. E9-2488
Filed 2-3-09; 8:45 am]

Billing code 4710-10-P



Now.... as far as the Stimulus package, the Congressional Budget Office had this to say in so many words.... "Obama, we don't need no Stinking Bailout!!!"  Actually, in more technical terms, here's what they said:
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/99xx/doc9958/01-08-Outlook_Testimony.pdf


Also: CBO anticipates that the current recession, which started in December 2007, will last until the second half of 2009, making it the longest recession since World War II. (The longest such recessions otherwise, the 1973–1974 and 1981–1982 recessions, both lasted 16 months. If the current recession were to continue beyond midyear, it would last at least 19 months.) It could also be the deepest recession during the postwar period: By CBO's estimates, economic output over the next two years will average 6.8 percent below its potential—that is, the level of output that would be produced if the economy's resources were fully employed (see Figure 1). This recession, however, may not result in the highest unemployment rate. That rate, in CBO's forecast, rises to 9.2 percent by early 2010 (up from a low of 4.4 percent at the end of 2006) but is still below the 10.8 percent rate seen near the end of the 1981–1982 recession.


And this:  Congressional Budget Office:  "President Obama's economic recovery package will actually hurt the economy more in the long run than if he were to do nothing, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday. CBO, the official scorekeepers for legislation, said the House and Senate bills will help in the short term but result in so much government debt that within a few years they would crowd out private investment, actually leading to a lower Gross Domestic Product over the next 10 years than if the government had done nothing."
Read rest of story at: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/feb/04/cbo-obama-stimulus-harmful-over-long-haul/


This is further evidence that this supposed stimulus bill is a joke and the biggest con job in the history of this country.  People who want the government to save them will be the downfall of this once great country.  If they spent as much time working to help themselves as they do sticking their hands out or in someone else's wallet, the world would be a better place.  No accountability or responsibility, just gimme, gimme, gimme...the sense of entitlement has reached disturbing levels.

Recessions are part of the natural business cycle.  I have a friend who is 65, retired military/realtor/broker.  He has always told me that these are "self-corrections".  The housing and stock markets can't just go up, up, up without ever coming down.  They have to go down to stay in line with their actual value.

Rahm Emanuel once advised that crisis means opportunity, and, dammit,  the Democrats have taken that message to heart.  They've exploited the sense of economic crisis in order to build a Trojan Horse stimulus bill that encompasses all of their legislative goals — and they're trying to stampede people into supporting it out of panic.

Hope and Change?  More like Fear and Loathing!

Here is a thought to ponder:

"You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it."

The late Dr. Adrian Rogers , 1931 to 2005

[pam]

Well it would bounce back in 2 years if and only if they let the businesses fail that are going to fail and allow the entrepenurial spirit of folks to start new businesses that will take the place of old ones. Secondly cut this damn government down to a CONSTITUTIONAL Government, where it is supposed to handle foreign affairs and leave domestic affairs to the states as per the 10th amendment. 

I like the fact that several states are declaring soverignty and telling the feds to kiss off.  That is a start. 

Somthin we can agree on...............

[Warph]

I have never been a big supporter of regulation...But wouldn't some regulation in these areas have helped to avoid at least SOME of this mess?

More regulation is not the answer, more personal responsibility is. 

Take the mortgage meltdown problems here in Arizona, Nevada and Calif.... it is G-d awful!   

I also can't help thinking how the humble real estate agent, that guy who regularly tops the most respected professions list, bears some responsibility in this also.  You wonder if they were working hand in glove with some of the questionable lenders.  Knowing full well that they might direct the prospective home purchaser in the direction of those lenders, then they could talk up the price of the home, thus exacerbating the bubble effect, and in turn making bigger commissions for themselves.  Their job was made easier in a buying market with the availability of 'easy' money.

The lenders probably thought that whichever way it went, they would always have the asset.  Whichever way it went, those agents always made their commission from the sale.  The only losers were the home owner, and as the bubble burst, then the lenders now had not one or two losses to spread across the portfolio, but hundreds and thousands of houses all losing tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars and more, hence the real need now to look for someone to bail them out of the mess they got themselves into.  It seems odd that they looked to the same guys who made it easier for them in the first place. 

From that point on, it just became a matter of blame diverting, and trying to cover their tracks.... and it is coming back to bite us again in 2009.

What the politicians won't say to you about the mortgage meltdown is simply that it's your fault, America. 

Plain and simple, it was your fault, but they can't say it because you not only don't want to hear the truth, America.... you want to be appeased not to mention that whenever a politician (normally mistakenly) tells them the G-d's honest truth (after he's roasted in the MSM) you turf him out of office.

Let's look at this mess ('cause it ain't going away) and go back to the beginning...which for me is found in the late 90's when the Democrats came up with the idea of helping poor visible minorities move to the middle class by making it easier to buy a home.

And yeah, It was the Democrats that started this whole mess and don't you forget it. 

Okay, their idea being that the white middle class was developed in the late 40's or early 50's when people began to buy a home as their bedrock investment which has ensured that when these folks die their children who are also in their own homes can pay them off and pass along the profits to their kids and so on and so on.

Seemed like a good idea on the surface but what began as a responsible program demanding 10% down with sufficient proof of employment and an appropriate formula that lets you know what size of mortgage you can safely handle quickly began to drop off the safeguards, the down payment dropped from 10 to 5 to 0%, then came sub-prime rates and finally interest only payments...... and then everything went to hell in a hand basket..

Now I'll conceded that the sales people that were selling these mortgages played into the greed of the people buying them by ignoring their real economic situation and provided them with larger mortgages than was responsible to do so, (bastards)  but again... why were these people looking at 2500 sq foot homes at $400,000 when their personal situation clearly showed a starter home was appropriate and that's where we really got off track.

Up until the late 80's people seemed to understand that you started out with a small home, a used car (just one per family) and unless you got your furniture as a wedding gift you only bought what you could afford, but then came the large furniture box stores saying don't pay a cent for 3 years and people loaded up with the best of everything.

So what really happened? Why is this a crisis, because PEOPLE GOT GREEDY and tried to hit a home run with a nice house, 2 cars and the best electronics and furniture while putting all the costs off and ignoring the idea of putting a little aside each month so when the time came they pay off the majority of the expenses. The doubled down on the housing market maintaining the greatest growth rate in history and were SHOCKED when the bubble popped as ever other bubble has popped in market history.

Politicians need to get out of the way and stop using the private sector to play their social engineering games.  The reason so many white middle class families came out of the 40's is because they used the GI bill effectively and worked their way up.  It wasn't a hand out, they fought and they were rewarded.

Today's generation wants the big handout without doing the heavy lifting and the democrats looking for votes played them with false promises.  I have no problem with helping visible minorities get a leg up and own a home thus helping them move their families slowly up the economic ladder but it has to be within a proper framework.  A minimum of 10% down, the rest insured by a government agency (you pay a premium folded into the mortgage payment) and a formula that ensures people only get a mortgage based on what they can pay back. 

It does no good to provide the illusion to people that the market can save them if they can't make their payments it does no good to trick them into believing they can have a Cadillac when a Chevy will do.  It's time to demand that people become accountable again.

I cannot believe I'm saying this but, America...stop blaming the politicians for your ills and start taking responsibility for you, yourself!  There... I've said it.  (I think I'm going to throw up.)

They can't fix what you broke, America, nor can they honestly talk about it if they believe they'll get fired for telling the truth.

[pam]

 I have pretty much decided just to stay away from this particular part of the forum but every once in a while I just got to....

Greed is what got this country in the shape it is in now but it DIDN'T happen in a democrat driven vacuum. This country has been off the track for years..democrat...republican...independant....politics is not the problem. The majorly warped view of what gives a person worth and the perverse ideas of what constitutes "success" in this country is what got this mess sloppin around.And trust me there were enough REPUBLICANS DEMOCRATS INDEPENDANTS ETC. to spread the blame around. Greed doesn't HAVE a political party. For every democrat "giving" some "undeserving low income person" a chance, handout, whatever,  there was a republican rakin in the cash. And vice versa....

For years I've watched people playin the keepin up with the jones game whether or not you could afford it. Advertisers play up to it....."Oh you MUST have this..or that.. or only the cool kids wear this or that....buy this and people will ENVY you...." "This is THE place to live...only the most exclusive neighborhood!" "This is THE school that will make your child successful!" "Give your kids this and they will be POPULAR!" "We have "EASY" credit!"

People built a HUGE house of cards. Now the winds come up...............................and they are surprised it's all fallin apart...

I believe EVERYBODY has the right to the American dream. I believe EVERYBODY should work for what they get. I do. My husband does. My kids do. I DON'T believe there are income limits on the right to a good life and a home of your own. I also don't believe there are race, gender, religious, whatever, limits on the right to the same.

What it's TIME for is people getting their PRIORITIES straight...........................

[redcliffsw]

Lawmakers in 20 states move to reclaim sovereignty

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=88218