In the first part of today's program, the guests - Sen. John Ensign (R-NV), Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO), and Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) - debated the merits of the stimulus bill and specifically what should be the top priorities should be. Breaking it down to its basic level (which no one in Washington can really seem to do and then convey effectively to the American people) is that Republicans would like to see a larger portion of the stimulus go to tax cuts to put more money in people's pockets and the Democrats want more money for the states and more spending on public works projects to create jobs.
Now the question that every ordinary American has, including this humble columnist, is how will it help me in my particular situation? The answer is that which ever philosophy eventually wins out, neither may directly help you. Giving tax cuts to Americans, in the form of a check a la President Bush, is really just another form of the T.A.R.P. in as much as that when most Americans receive that pittance of a check, they will pay their respective credit bank infusing the banks with additional cash. On the other hand, investing in public works projects is necessarily going to better the working situation of the majority of Americans working in the private sector.
There really isn't any sense in getting into the specifics of what each politician said because it was mostly bluster, protecting philosophical turf. And they can't get it straight anyway. For example, when Mr. Gregory asked Rep. Pence about nationalizing the banks, the Congressman said that we can't nationalize them but they need more capital. So where are they going to get the capital from... the government of course. And if they get money from the government then they have to answer to the government, hence nationalizing them.
It was all about partisanship and that's what it is going to continue to be about. Democrats won the day in the elections but they don't want to bully. This column translates that into not wanting to take responsibility for making a decision that may fail. We're not saying that their strategy will fail, but they have to be willing to step up on their own without the other side. Republicans have no problem bullying and when they succeed, they gloat. When they fail, they deny.
So what do we do? Everyone needs cash and there simply just isn't enough to go around. Republicans, this columns feels, do not want any bill - let things take their course - free market economy and if you sink... that's just tough - you drown. That's not going to do. You can reference that the Japanese in the 1990's did stimulus after stimulus and nothing worked... a lost decade. This is going to happen with America - a lost decade. However, we need to do what ever we can and if that means the government spending obscene amounts of money to stem complete collapse then so be it. If there are lines for food, trust that there will be plenty of blame to go around.
Many commentators, the pundits, say that the general public doesn't understand the difference between the T.A.R.P. and the stimulus bill. We call them pompous 'think-they-know-it-all' asses. We know the difference, but what we don't know is if the money is being spent in the best possible way and that's because we don't have the key to the cash draw.
This stimulus is not panacea and endless tinkering isn't going to make it so. That's what we truly have to understand.
Speaking of a panacea, or lack thereof, MTP's second guest today, The Washington Post's Tom Ricks, discussed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan through the prism of his new book 'The Gamble.' With so much going on here at home, the ever more tenuous situations of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been relegated not to the back seat, but the trunk of the metaphoric auto. However, given this interview, we will not be able to get out of Iraq in 16 months. It is unrealistic so get your head around it now. Mr. Ricks pointed out that what supporters expect and what the generals will advise will increasingly be at odds with one another. Amb. Crocker, in Iraq, stated that the events that we will remember about Iraq have yet to happen. What that means, we don't know, but it sure does sound ominous and that we shouldn't expect some fledgling democracy in that country. When we relax in Iraq, the factions of Iraqi generals will take control and not necessarily to our liking. The administration has been correct in that the real fight, politically and militarily, is in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Nuclear weapons in the hands of a government sympathetic to the Taliban and the Mujahideen is the greatest threat we face. This is a situation way beyond the hand of our control, but like the spiraling situation that is our economy, we need to throw everything we have at it. Washington still operates in a bubble with both Democrats and Republicans picking their petty fights and in the meantime, we've all been thrown from the dock perpetually caught in the wake of a boat that has a broken rudder.
So Washington needs to make some tough decisions instead of putting them off and stick them... because God knows, we ordinary citizens have to live with them.
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