Answer to 10 Things You Should Know About Obama's Stimulus Plan

There is nothing original in the Obama stimulus plan. There is a shift of the problem source. If you want to do all you can to eliminate cancer from your life's prognosis, you don't quit smoking cigarettes and switch to a high fat, high cholesterol diet to substitute. You're still going to be prone to cancer, but probably of a different type. You haven't done anything to make any significant difference in the ultimate outcome; you've merely changed the source of the same problem. This is basically what's been done with this plan.

Some people are gungho capitalism and some are gungho socialism, but neither works in its pure form. When we speak of free markets, they need to be tempered by people who are responsible, and where greed doesn't enter into decisions. No market can be totally free of government intervention because of human frailty, just as no society dependent on government can ever have equality for the same reasons. Business and government all involve human greed.

Our system is broken. We have very delineated branches of government that are supposed to be checks and balances on each other. Through corruption and through greed there is no significant check on any, and no balance has been achieved. When the justice department, the highest symbol of fairness, has been infiltrated by politics and people who control the outcome of justice, you cannot expect any change that is not change to rectify the source of the problems to amount to anything but more problems, and finally the destruction of the society.

Partisan politics does nothing to solve problems. One only has to look at the gridlock demonstrated every time there is a vote in the Senate and the House to understand this. Unfortunately, largely due to a poor educational system, we have voters who vote with only a very basic understanding of what policies presented really mean.

Recently, an email circulated that was posted in at least two places on Gather that shows how little people understand what is really happening. Once again, I expect little from this except more partisan comments, and that's the way it is. I can accept that too.

Let's take a look at some of the glaring points in the email that are just a façade for what is beneath the surface of the nice way they sound. How will they be effective when we take into consideration the costs involved, the money spent that we don't have to spend?  How can you justify piling insurmountable debt on top of debt to get out of debt that is the real source of the probem in the first place? Don't tell me it's an investment for which you know there will be a profit unless you can show me some numbers. I know you can't because there is not one person who can. That's what makes this not just risky business, but irresponsible and sloppy policymaking.

Makes a $634 billion down payment on fixing health care that will go a long way toward paying for a more efficient, more affordable health care system that covers every single American.

There's nothing new here either.  

"William A. Dombi, vice president of the National Association for Home Care and Hospice, a trade group, said this proposal would directly affect frail, sick older people.Patients would lose access to care very quickly...Over 70 percent of all home health agencies would be operating in the red." President George W. Bush made a similar proposal last year, but it died in Congress."

The first point in the email, for one example, is about fixing healthcare. Unlike many who think it's just fine the way it has been, I do not at all think so, but I don't at all think the fix presented is going to be any better than what we have. It's merely a change to a different source of the problem. Instead of the pharmaceutical and insurance companies controlling our health, the government will control our health. As long as control is not in the hands of the people, this can no longer be a government of, for, and by the people. The government has become as separate an entity from the people as any insurance company, any pharmaceutical company, any bank, or any institution that has been responsible for the demise of the people's control. The people themselves have been their own enemies for allowing it to get to this point.

Efficient? Anyone who has ever had to deal with government knows that government agencies are some of the least efficient, red tape, beaureaucratic monsters that you can imagine. More affordable? What is more affordable? What's affordable to me is not what's affordable to you, so what is more affordable is a comparison of a comparison at best. It sounds nice, but it's all in the presentation. I can say the beautifully designed gardening package contained an earthy, rich, mineral enhanced substance, but it's still a bag of shit.

Invests more than $100 billion in clean energy technology, creating millions of green jobs that can never be outsourced.

It's also deceptive because, for just one instance, any IT technology needed will be no different from any other IT technology needed for any other industry or business. There is no reason to think that this particular industry need will be any less outsourced than any other. Software engineering, database modeling, programming, and other IT jobs are outsourced in every industry I can think of except the military. It may create some jobs that are blue collar jobs turned green, but I just know that people don't get the idea.

 It's also a lie because "policies that drive up energy costs across the nation, as Obama intends, will drive many of these jobs not elsewhere in the country but overseas. Companies and individuals will take their time before adopting more expensive green technologies, especially with the current economic condition." This is what Bill Coleman of Silicon Valley has to say.

Reduces taxes for 95% of working Americans

"The president's plan to charge fees to industries that spew greenhouse gases amounts to a stealthy tax increase for all Americans that will far exceed the new $400 annual tax cut for workers that he wants to extend beyond 2010."

The deeper issue isn't whether he's taking money from those making $250K and more that the capitalists all think is going to result in less circulation of wealth from the top. This is going to affect everyone even without that factor. The taxes may not come out of your income, but if you, for one split second, think that you will be able to afford any kind of reasonable lifestyle with the taxes that will be imposed on the companies distributing your daily goods and services, and if you think that this cost is not going to be passed along to you at unaffordable prices, you may as well start interpreting your daydreams for a living. Forget about your progeny, this is going to affect you now!

 Brings our troops home from Iraq on a firm timetable

"The Obama Administration is set to boost American force deployment in Afghanistan by another 20,000 to 30,000 troops, bringing the total number of foreign troops to about 90,000 during 2009, and has said that the fight in Afghanistan will run possibly for another 10 years. These moves are in the belief that somehow more troops and more fighting could open the way for transformation of Afghanistan into a stable and secure state."

"Yet, it needs to be emphasized theproblem of Afghanistan is largely a political, not military a one. For as long as there is no effective government under a widely acceptable leader, no amount of international military operations could prove to be fruitful. It's also not clear how much more money will be needed to fund military efforts in Afghanistan. Currently the budget request has assumed $50 billion a year as a place holder. Any more than that would negate the savings realized from the Iraq withdrawal."

This is another change of the source of the same problem. We no longer will be fighting Bush's war; we're going to now fight Obama's.

 Reverses growing income inequality

Any reduction in taxes will more than be spent by the average American due to Obama's energy proposal amounts to a tax that would increase energy costs for all Americans.

Invests more than $100 billion in clean energy technology

"Investing in renewable energyis a long-term proposition, and a successful economic stimulus needs to have an immediate impact...People need to be hiring right away and building projects right away. And there are very few environmental projects you can think of that are in that category in terms of laying on more windmill building, laying on more solar panel building. To ramp up those industries very quickly is probably not possible. Economist David Kreutzer at the conservative Heritage Foundation isn't convinced it's even a good idea. A windmill might be good, weatherizing a building might be good, but we need to look at the costs as well as the benefits and compare them. Is it worth the money that we're spending."

Closes multi-billion-dollar tax loopholes for big oil companies

This raises the cost of the energy we have now.

"These proposals make no sense during this economy, when increased American energy could result in new jobs and more tax and royalty revenues for state and federal governments."

 Dramatically increases funding for the SEC and the CFTC

 Once again, the probem is that we're throwing money at problems that haven't been addressed. Just because there is incompetence in an agency or business does not mean that allocating money is going to solve the problem. Here's a perfect example. They want to solve the problem of gang violence with more money, but they're allocating the money in the wrong places to curb that violence.

"Such funds would be better used on programs with proven records of improving community safety, not on strategies designed only to increase law enforcement presence in already over-policed communities. "Even though cops swarm our neighborhoods every day, it has not increased public safety. We are no more safe in our neighborhoods now than in the '80s. Investments in education, community services, schools and jobs are what make communities healthier."

Tells it straight.

"I'm proud that we passed the recovery plan free of earmarks, and I want to pass a budget next year that ensures that each dollar we spend reflects only our most important national priorities."

That's just a lie. There are over 9000 earmarks in the bill.

I've only highlighted the most disturbing aspects of the email. If you want to discuss the others, that's fine too.