History is Happening Now

Let me be clear: Democrats are the second worst party in American politics. The first worst is the Republicans.

What makes me say on this particular day that the Democrats the second worst, and not the first best?

First of all, Democrats have dominated Washington for only about two weeks, and they are already losing their first major battle over the House Democrats’ $800-billion-plus stimulus package. As E. J. Dionne writes in his column “Obama Losing Stimulus Fight to Defeated GOP,” Republican attacks may rely on making mountains out of molehills, but the attacks are sticking:

But such volleys have gone largely unreturned, and the biggest danger for Obama will come if Republican attacks erode support for the stimulus among Democrats. That’s why the president will be spending more time with congressional Democrats in the coming days. The administration’s visionary emphasis on winning expansive Republican support has been replaced by a down-to-earth struggle to get a bill through the Senate.

Why are Democrats losing? There are clues in this piece of reporting by Slate’s John Dickerson, entitled “Bipartisalesmanship.”

Many Senate Democrats claim that the bill has too many provisions that don’t meet the definition of “timely, targeted, and temporary.” This irritates their House colleagues, in part because it echoes a line House Speaker Nancy Pelosi once used against Republicans in a previous stimulus debate and in part because it echoes the spin Republicans are using against this stimulus bill. Republicans hope to define the bill by its smallest and most absurd provisions even if they are a tiny fraction of its cost. When Democrats also single out those provisions, they are merely “repeating GOP talking points,” as one Democratic House leadership aide put it. …

The tension for Obama is how far to go in accommodating the Senate without causing too much heartburn among Democrats in the House. House Speaker Pelosi met with OMB Director Peter Orszag and White House economic adviser Larry Summers Tuesday night in her House office and let them know her caucus could go only so far. It would be able to accept some of the tax-cut provisions being added to the Senate bill, like the adjustment that keeps the Alternative Minimum Tax from hitting middle-class families. But House Democrats were not going to see the bill they put together thoroughly undone.

The worry is not so much that Obama will lose the vote on the stimulus bill because of Democratic defections. It’s that his allies in the House and Senate will have to swallow hard to support it, or that the process of getting to yes will be bruising. This will create resistance for the next tough vote Obama asks them to take. If he creates too much trouble for himself, by the end of the year the president’s office hours will have to extend all day long.

I used to call this stimulus bill “Obama’s” stimulus bill — because that’s how I heard Nancy Pelosi describe it in an interview a few weeks ago. But I see now that the bill was “put together” by House Republicans who are “not going to see the bill they put together thoroughly undone.”

Unfortunately, the bill they “put together” was put together in a way that invites mockery. Here’s more from Dickerson’s report:

Barack Obama held office hours Wednesday. In 15-minute increments in the early afternoon, he met in the Oval Office with senators who want to modify his stimulus bill. Democrat Ben Nelson of Nebraska talked about removing spending provisions from the bill. He has a tentative list of cuts totaling more than $50 billion that include everything from $122.5 million for new and renovated polar icebreakers to $198 million in military benefits for Filipino veterans of World War II.

Why does the “stimulus” bill include $198 million in military benefits for Filipino veterans of World War II? Are we meant to believe that John Maynard Keynes himself would recommend extending military benefits to Filipinos as a way to stimulate the economy?

E.J. Dionne writes in his column:

Obama’s network appearances were planned as a response to a wholly unanticipated development: Republicans — short on new ideas, low on votes, and deeply unpopular in the polls — have been winning the media wars over the president’s central initiative.

They have done so largely by focusing on minor bits of the stimulus that amount, as Obama said in at least two of his network interviews, to “less than 1 percent of the overall package.” But Republicans have succeeded in defining the proposal by its least significant parts.

Gosh! Who would have expected that? Republicans opposing a spending bill by pointing out the most absurd and laughable items in the bill? In case my sarcasm isn’t coming across, let me be clear: Whichever Congressman or Congresswoman decided to put $198 million in military benefits for Filipino veterans into this bill should have to wear a scarlet “I” on their lapels for the entirety of this Congress. (“I” stands for IDIOT!) $198 million may not seem like a lot of money when stacked up against an $800-billion-plus bill, but the damage this silly provision is doing to the larger bill’s prospects in Congress is vast — and the same can be said for dozens of other ridiculous provisions.

Consider this from a recent column by George Will:

During World War II, Oscar Levant, the pianist and wit, was asked by his draft board, “Do you think you can kill?” He replied, “I don’t know about strangers, but friends, yes.” Barack Obama might have felt that way when his Democratic friends in Congress proposed expanding contraception services as an economic “stimulus.” Defending that (which was eventually dropped as indefensible), Nancy Pelosi said, “States are in terrible fiscal budget crises,” partly because of all they do for children’s health and education. Therefore, contraception, by reducing the number of wee parasites, “will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government.” So: Children are a net cost to government and therefore (non sequitur alert) counterstimulative. Pelosi argues that a trillion dollars of other government outlays will be stimulative. In any case, the stimulus effect of more contraception would have been at least nine months in arriving.

What Democrat moron thought it would be a good idea to put contraceptives in this bill? Maybe this Democrat wasn’t a moron — maybe he was a saboteur sent into Congress undercover to plant provisions in the stimulus bill that would enable George Will to write columns like this one. Or maybe Nancy Pelosi decided to put an early stop to all Obama’s talk of bipartisanship by forcing our new president to support a bill too littered with nonsense to attract even 100% of Democrats, let along a Republican or two.

House Democrats won’t get their contraceptives now, nor will they score their benefits for Filipino veterans. But because of stupid items such as these, Democrats may end up having no choice except to accept changes that could actually weaken the bill. (Spending on contraceptives and benefits for Filipino veterans may be highly beneficial — but it doesn’t belong in this bill, as it contributes to the notion that the bill is just a hodge-podge of random spending items.)

Nancy Pelosi says House Democrats will “only go so far” in allowing their bill to be modified. She’s clearly threatening Obama, saying House Dems will actually vote down the bill if it is significantly altered so it can pass in the Senate.

Here’s my advice to Obama: Screw Pelosi. Do whatever it takes to get a bipartisan bill, even if it means alienating some Congressional Democrats. Otherwise, the age of Democratic dominance may be cut short by some MORON Congressman and his benefits for Filipino veterans. (No offense to Filipinos.)

What will Senate Democrats do now that President Obama’s $800-billion-plus fiscal stimulus bill is on the Senate floor? Will they make big changes to the bill in order to get Senate and House Republicans to support it? Or will they make only minor changes, more-or-less ensuring that the bill ends up winning with almost no Republican support whatsoever?

Most progressives would hate to see Democrats start making big changes to the bill in order to please Republicans. Their reasons are as follows:

1. Republicans have horrible ideas and a horrible record on the economy. So it’s likely that if Republicans have a say in the stimulus bill, they will weaken it, soften it, dilute it — screw it up, in other words. We need this bill to work, and Republicans are horrible at making things work — so we should keep them as far away from it as possible.

2. It’s not at all clear that Republicans are negotiating in good faith. If Democrats start accepting Republican-sponsored amendments or seriously considering Republican ideas about how to “improve” the bill, there’s still a good chance that most if not all Republicans in Congress will reject the bill anyway — and then Democrats will have weakened, softened, diluted the bill for no reason at all. If Democrats are going to be held responsible for this bill, then they might as well make sure it’s the best possible bill.

I want to make a different argument (albeit tentatively): I think it’s possible that this bill can be changed in ways that will convince a good number of Republican Senators and Congressmen to vote for it — and these changes don’t necessarily have to weaken the bill’s ability to stimulate the economy over the short term. And Democrats should consider making these changes – even if it means abandoning spending on projects that will be good for the country.

First of all, it’s important to recognize that a political battle is underway right now — not over whether the bill is too big — but over whether the bill spends the money in the right way.

And Democrats are losing this battle.

Consider the following recent poll results:

Most Americans are now looking for major revisions in the way the government is approaching the recession. 

A Gallup poll out Tuesday showed that a majority of Americans want Congress to either reject or make “major changes” to the economic stimulus package on Capitol Hill. 

The poll, conducted from Friday through Sunday, found that 75 percent of Americans want Congress to pass some version of the plan. But the survey reflected deepening doubts about the effectiveness of the programs and spending items currently being considered by federal lawmakers. Only 38 percent of those polled favored the existing stimulus proposal, down from a slight majority holding that view in the Jan. 28 Gallup survey. 

Thirty-seven percent want major changes and 17 percent reject the plan outright.

Why are the Republicans winning? It’s largely because the Democratic approach to this bill seems to be that any spending that involves hiring people to do work can rightly be called “stimulus.” And as long as most of this sort of spending is stimulus, Democrats figure they might as well spend the money on things they think will not only stimulate the economy, but also help the country in the long-term. This may be exactly right from a policy perspective.

But a lot of people aren’t buying it, and they are winning support from editorial writers and pundits all over America. Consider this recent editorial from the L.A. Times:

President Obama and congressional Democrats have emphasized that their proposal isn’t the typical exercise in pork-barrel politics. Lawmakers haven’t been allowed to pile on earmarks for pet local projects, and the largest sums are being divided among the states and cities through existing formulas. But too many of the items have little apparent connection with economic growth — witness the nearly $5 billion for prevention, wellness, “comparative effectiveness research” and training in the health field, the $2.1 billion for Head Start and the $300 million to improve teacher quality, just to name a few examples from the 647-page House bill. Other provisions, such as the $64 billion for preventing layoffs at schools, colleges and “high priority” state programs, are about saving jobs, not creating them. In the short term, there may be no difference between preventing job cuts and increasing payrolls — one prevents a bad situation from worsening, the other makes a good situation better. But an investment this large should pay long-term dividends by increasing productivity, and that’s hard to do when so much of the money is going toward maintaining the status quo.

There’s no question in my mind that the spending proposals described above are good. The money should be spent. But the L.A. Times is writing that these proposals “have little apparent connection with economic growth” and this is a sentiment I’ve heard over and over and over again as I’ve listened to Republican and supposedly “objective” analysis of the stimulus bill.

Here’s a “news analysis” from the New York Times with another troubling depiction of the stimulus bill:

Taken together, the economic stimulus plan and the banking bailout have quickly melded into a bitter political and ideological clash, barely two weeks into the Obama presidency.

Some of what is going on might best be called a classic case of pent-up demand — demand by Democrats for the kinds of programs that they could never get passed during the Bush years.

After years of battling with a White House that questioned the science behind global warming, Democratic lawmakers see a chance to begin programs aimed at environmental protection, using economic justifications for efforts like developing low-emission cars. And with a Democrat in the White House, they also see an opening to push for increased spending on education.

The efforts are fueled by a liberal base that supported Mr. Obama’s promise that he would tackle the biggest issues. That same base is concerned that the long slog ahead will force a delay or an abandonment of those ambitions.

As a result, there is $54 billion in the House bill for new forms of “American energy,” a phrase with an air of nationalism, along with a series of “Buy America” requirements of dubious legality under trade treaties; $141 billion for education; $24 billion for lowering health care costs; and $6 billion for broadband service, the digital equivalent of Lyndon B. Johnson electrifying the Hill Country in Texas.

(Some critics of that effort say it is pitifully small, too small to fulfill Mr. Obama’s campaign promise that all Americans should enjoy “the highest form of broadband access.”)

To those who argue that many of the programs will take years to get rolling, their advocates have replied, “So what?”

“It’s not as if we can just fix what’s wrong and go back to normal,” said James K. Galbraith, an economist at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs in Austin. “Can you overdo? Maybe, but it’s easier to pull back later than to make up for the fact that you did too little.”

But the result is that a piece of “emergency” legislation that would spend heavily to stanch the killing of jobs is now transforming into a series of long-term commitments that are sure to add enormously to the national debt, and keep adding to it long after the Panic of 2008 and the recession — or worse — that it set off are consigned to history.

Galbraith’s “so what?” may sound great to Democrats like me who think the proposed spending described above is a great investment in our country’s future — but his glib indifference only fuels the idea that this bill isn’t about rescuing the American economy so much as it’s about Democrats following through on their political agenda, as the “analysis” suggests. Articles like this one — from the New York Times, no less – erode public support for this bill.  

And then Republicans put out lists like this one, outlining what they call “wasteful” parts of the bill:

(CNN) — On Monday, Congressional Republican leaders put out a list of what they call wasteful provisions in the Senate version of the nearly $900 billion stimulus bill that is being debated:

• $2 billion earmark to re-start FutureGen, a near-zero emissions coal power plant in Illinois that the Department of Energy defunded last year because it said the project was inefficient.

• A $246 million tax break for Hollywood movie producers to buy motion picture film.

• $650 million for the digital television converter box coupon program.

• $88 million for the Coast Guard to design a new polar icebreaker (arctic ship).

• $448 million for constructing the Department of Homeland Security headquarters.

• $248 million for furniture at the new Homeland Security headquarters.

• $600 million to buy hybrid vehicles for federal employees.

• $400 million for the Centers for Disease Control to screen and prevent STD’s.

• $1.4 billion for rural waste disposal programs.

• $125 million for the Washington sewer system.

• $150 million for Smithsonian museum facilities.

• $1 billion for the 2010 Census, which has a projected cost overrun of $3 billion.

• $75 million for “smoking cessation activities.”

• $200 million for public computer centers at community colleges.

• $75 million for salaries of employees at the FBI.

• $25 million for tribal alcohol and substance abuse reduction.

• $500 million for flood reduction projects on the Mississippi River.

• $10 million to inspect canals in urban areas.

• $6 billion to turn federal buildings into “green” buildings.

• $500 million for state and local fire stations.

• $650 million for wildland fire management on forest service lands.

• $1.2 billion for “youth activities,” including youth summer job programs.

• $88 million for renovating the headquarters of the Public Health Service.

• $412 million for CDC buildings and property.

• $500 million for building and repairing National Institutes of Health facilities in Bethesda, Maryland.

• $160 million for “paid volunteers” at the Corporation for National and Community Service.

• $5.5 million for “energy efficiency initiatives” at the Department of Veterans Affairs National Cemetery Administration.

• $850 million for Amtrak.

• $100 million for reducing the hazard of lead-based paint.

• $75 million to construct a “security training” facility for State Department Security officers when they can be trained at existing facilities of other agencies.

• $110 million to the Farm Service Agency to upgrade computer systems.

• $200 million in funding for the lease of alternative energy vehicles for use on military installations.

Obviously, we could go through this list, line by line, and explain why most of these items ARE stimulus. The idea that it isn’t “stimulative” to spend money on construction projects (artic ships, federal department headquarters, museums, flood reduction infrastructure) or upgrade computer systems, doesn’t make even a shred of sense. It is especially confounding to see a $1.2 billion for “youth summer job program” on this list — At a time when so many otherwise-employable youths will be unemployed due to a horrible job market, isn’t it a good idea to keep these people working so they can pay rent, spend money, build their resumes, etc.? And most of the other items on this list will create jobs of one kind or another.

But why in God’s name would we give Hollywood a tax break for the purchase of film? It may be a good idea, but it will strike almost every Republican in America as an absurd idea that obviously has more to do with satisfying a special interest group than with stimulating the economy.

These “minor” items, and countless others we’ve heard mocked on television by Republican pundits, are what the less-than-awesome poll numbers are about — not about whether more of the money should go to business tax cuts. And for people who don’t really understand economics and don’t accept the Keynsian notion that any spending is stimulative spending, these items seem random and cute. They suggest that Nancy Pelosi simply went before the Democratic Caucus in the House and said, “We need to spend $819 billion dollars. What should we spend it on?”

I think a stimulus bill may actually be more effective if it has significant Republican support. Consider the following excerpt from the L.A. Times editorial:

Stimulating the economy is more of an art than a science. A country relies partly on the strength of its resources — such as its workers’ productivity, the availability of cheap capital, the markets for its goods — and partly on consumers’ confidence. The latter is especially important in the United States, where consumer spending accounts for about 70% of the economy. Because any legislative effort to boost employment and end the recession will take months, if not years, to deliver its full benefits, it’s important that the psychic benefits are felt immediately. If people and businesses believe that the effort will improve job security and increase the demand for goods and services, they’ll be more likely to spend more and take more risks. But if they see the stimulus package as just another boondoggle for special interests, they’ll continue the miserliness that is exacerbating the downturn.

The Times’ point isn’t that the current version of the stimulus bill is a “boondoggle for special interests.” The Times’ point is that if the bill appears to be a boondoggle, this hurts the recovery.

There is no doubt that if the current version of the bill passes without any Republican support, Republicans will argue passionately until the end of time that the bill isn’t working, didn’t work – because it can’t possible work. The Republican Party has staked its entire identity on the idea that the current stimulus bill won’t stimulate the economy, and nothing will ever force them to abandon this view.

Unfortunately, I think Fox News journalist/pundit Brit Hume (who called it a “horrible bill”) was correct when he said this on Fox News Sunday:

When the economy recovers, the problem is we’re not going to know what did it. We’re not going to know whether it was just pent-up demand (where) people finally started buying because they had to, or whether it was because of the injections — massive injections, quite apart from the stimulus bill, of cash into the economy by the Fed. We’ll never really know, and the argument about whether this stuff works or not will go on forever.

It’s important to separate out the argument Hume is making about whether the bill will work and the argument he is making about “the argument” over whether the bill will work. Even if the current version of the bill is entirely successful, Republicans will never — NEVER — concede that it did, because such a concession would be the equivalent of saying “we were wrong about the most important issue this country has faced in a generation.”

If the bill passes (without Republican support) and then the economy recovers, Republicans will make the arguments Hume outlined above: that the real reason for the recovery was the release of pent-up demand or the injection of Fed money.

I absolutely believe that if this stimulus package is considered a success, Democrats in Congress will keep their majorities in Congress in 2010, and Obama will win reelection in 2012. If, on the other hand, the bill is considered a failure, the Republicans may win back the House and then the White House. Republicans know that this will be the battle, and they are gearing up to argue vehemently — for the survival of the party — that this bill is bad and won’t work, isn’t working, didn’t work, because that is their path back to power.

And if the current bill passes, the entire right-wing political establishment of this country — including politicians, pundits, radio talk show hosts, columnists, “journalists,” editorial writers, college professors, economists, etc. — will launch an aggressive, unyeilding campaign to malign the stimulus bill as a useless waste of taxpayer money. This means Republicans all over the country will hear that message all over again, and most of them will find the argument persuasive. The Gallup Poll above suggests the American people are already buying this argument. 

If more than a third of the country decides the stimulus was a waste, will that prevent the “psychic benefits” described in the L.A. Times editorial? Will that cause people and businesses to “continue the miserliness that is exacerbating the downturn”?

If, on the other hand, Democrats make major concessions — not by reducing spending in the bill, but by spending money on items that will be just as effective at stimulating the economy but won’t provide reasons for Republicans to vote against it — and if, as a result, Republicans support the bill, it will be highly problematic for Republicans to argue later that the bill was failure (just as it was problematic for Democrats to argue the Iraq War was a bad idea after voting to authorize it).

Here’s my proposal: Democrats should eliminate every single item of spending in the bill that Republicans have called “wasteful,” and spend that money instead on items that Republican Senators and Congressmen specifically request — items that Democrats believe would be roughly equal in their “stimulative” impact on the economy.

After the bill passes, Democrats should propose additional spending on these “wasteful” projects and force Republicans to block the spending with filabusters. Then, in 2010, the American people can decide whether to reward Republicans for their filabustering, or reward Democrats for leading this country through the worse economic crisis since the Great Depression.

Please tell me why I’m wrong to contradict my hero, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, in arguing for big concessions to the Republicans. (I’m probably wrong, but I want to know why I’m wrong.)

Do the folks who write editorials for the Wall Street Journal ever talk to the folks who write articles for the Wall Street Journal?

Consider recent reporting/opining about Barack Obama’s $800-billion-plus economic stimulus bill. Here’s how Greg Hitt and Elizabeth Williamson describe it in their article from January 28, 2009:

The economic stimulus package proposed by Democratic House leaders totals $825 billion and includes three broad pieces: a $365.6 billion spending measure for such brick-and-mortar projects as highways and bridges; a $180 billion measure to boost jobless benefits and Medicaid, among other things; and a $275 billion tax-relief package, which includes a plan to give a $500 payroll tax holiday to all workers, a proposal from Mr. Obama’s presidential campaign.

If you pay attention to the arguments that the super-pundits of the right are making in their efforts to defeat this bill, you’d think it was different. Here’s an excerpt from a recent editorial in the Wall Street Journal:

In selling the plan, President Obama has said this bill will make “dramatic investments to revive our flagging economy.” Well, you be the judge. Some $30 billion, or less than 5% of the spending in the bill, is for fixing bridges or other highway projects. There’s another $40 billion for broadband and electric grid development, airports and clean water projects that are arguably worthwhile priorities.

Add the roughly $20 billion for business tax cuts, and by our estimate only $90 billion out of $825 billion, or about 12 cents of every $1, is for something that can plausibly be considered a growth stimulus. And even many of these projects aren’t likely to help the economy immediately. As Peter Orszag, the President’s new budget director, told Congress a year ago, “even those [public works] that are ‘on the shelf’ generally cannot be undertaken quickly enough to provide timely stimulus to the economy.”

So let’s try to understand. According to the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page, the following things can “plausibly be considered a growth stimulus”: fixing bridges or other highway projects, broadband and electric grid development, airports and clean water projects. Presumably, all these projects fall under the category of “a $365.6 billion spending measure for such brick-and-mortar projects as highways and bridges,” as reported in the news article. So if you subtract the $70 billion in construction projects mentioned in the editorial from the $365.6 billion in the news article, you get … $295 billion in “such brick-and-mortar projects as highways and bridges.”

Why can the $70 billion mentioned “plausibly be considered a growth stimulus” but the other $295 billion can’t? The editorial doesn’t say.

Also, the editorial refers to the $20 billion in business tax cuts as spending that “can plausibly be considered stimulus,” leaving out at least 90% of “a $275 billion tax-relief package, which includes a plan to give a $500 payroll tax holiday to all workers,” as reported in the article.

Why can $20 billion in business tax cuts “plausibly be considered stimulus,” but more than $250 billion in additional tax cuts cannot? Once again, the editorial doesn’t say. It’s as though the rest of the tax cuts in the bill don’t exist.

The editorial has this to say later on:

Here’s another lu-lu: Congress wants to spend $600 million more for the federal government to buy new cars. Uncle Sam already spends $3 billion a year on its fleet of 600,000 vehicles. Congress also wants to spend $7 billion for modernizing federal buildings and facilities. The Smithsonian is targeted to receive $150 million; we love the Smithsonian, too, but this is a job creator?

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand how it might help the economy if the United States government pumped $600 million into the market for new cars at a time when the American auto industry is on the verge of collapse. And as for the $7 billion for “modernizing federal buildings and facilities,” it’s impossible to fathom how the Wall Street Journal could miss that this project supports jobs: It provides money to employ the people who will be modernizing federal buildings and facilities.

It’s interesting how the editorial uses different terms at different times in order to avoid acknowledging the incoherence of its arguments. For example, the editorial refers to some projects as “arguably worthwhile priorities,” as if the most important criteria we should use to evaluate spending items is whether the spending is “worthwhile.” Then, in the next paragraph, it refers to projects that “can plausibly be considered a growth stimulus,” as if the most important issue is not whether a project is “worthwhile,” but whether a project stimulates growth. Then, later on, the editorial asks if a particular project is a “job creator,” as if this is the most important issue.

What if the editorial were forced to be consistent — forced, in other words, to evaluate whether the modernization of federal buildings and facilities is “worthwhile” or “can plausibly be considered a growth stimulus”? I think the answers to these questions would obviously be yes, and the same goes for the plan to spend a measley $600 million on cars.

Here’s another paragraph from the editorial:

We’ve looked it over, and even we can’t quite believe it. There’s $1 billion for Amtrak, the federal railroad that hasn’t turned a profit in 40 years; $2 billion for child-care subsidies; $50 million for that great engine of job creation, the National Endowment for the Arts; $400 million for global-warming research and another $2.4 billion for carbon-capture demonstration projects. There’s even $650 million on top of the billions already doled out to pay for digital TV conversion coupons.

In discussing the $1 billion for Amtrak, they abandon altogether the idea that the spending should be “worthwhile” or “stimulus” or a “job creator,” and assert instead that Amtrak shouldn’t get the money because it hasn’t turned a profit in 40 years. Why is it relevant that Amtrak doesn’t turn a profit? The editorial doesn’t say. Then, it mysteriously mentions child-care subsidies and then refuses to make any argument about why it’s notable — an understandable omission, since these subsidies are worthwhile, they do create jobs, they can be considered stimulus, and child care workers generally turn a small profit.

And there’s this bit in the editorial:

Oh, and don’t forget education, which would get $66 billion more. That’s more than the entire Education Department spent a mere 10 years ago and is on top of the doubling under President Bush. Some $6 billion of this will subsidize university building projects. If you think the intention here is to help kids learn, the House declares on page 257 that “No recipient . . . shall use such funds to provide financial assistance to students to attend private elementary or secondary schools.” Horrors: Some money might go to nonunion teachers.

First of all, it’s fascinating to consider the Wall Street Journal’s argument: If you think the intention behind spending $66 billion on education is to help children learn, you’re wrong — and the reason you’re wrong is that the money won’t give students tuition to private schools. Consider how stupid or blinded by ideology you’d have to be to accept this argument as logical. Furthermore, the Wall Street Journal is now suggesting that this $66 billion should be evaluated based on whether it helps kids learn. What about “stimulus?” What about “job creation?” What about “worthwhile priorities?” Why can it “plausibly be considered a growth stimulus” to repair a road or a bridge, but not a school building?

The editorial also includes this:

Another “stimulus” secret is that some $252 billion is for income-transfer payments — that is, not investments that arguably help everyone, but cash or benefits to individuals for doing nothing at all. There’s $81 billion for Medicaid, $36 billion for expanded unemployment benefits, $20 billion for food stamps, and $83 billion for the earned income credit for people who don’t pay income tax. While some of that may be justified to help poorer Americans ride out the recession, they aren’t job creators.

So now the issue at hand is whether these expenditures “help everyone,” and whether these expenditures are “job creators.” Obviously, by definiton, jobless benefits are not going to be job creators — but isn’t it obvious that expanding benefits to the poor and unemployed will help the economy, as the poor and unemployed are the most likely to spend the money given to them, rather than saving or investing it? Can’t these programs “plausibly be considered growth stimulus?”

As for the idea that the spending should “help everyone,” it’s hard to see how federal money spent repairing a bridge on the west coast will help folks on the east coast, but these projects are apparently acceptable to the Wall Street Journal.

The editorial is so transparently disingenuous and manipulative that it’s hard to understand why such as editorial isn’t embarressing to the newspaper — but then, the Journal’s owner, Rupert Murdoch, probably figures that right-wingers aren’t looking for clarity and logic.

I’m predicting the final vote on Obama’s $800 billion-plus fiscal stimulus bill will be split along party lines, with only a few rogue Republicans in the House and Senate voting to support the bill.

In spite of Obama’s extraordinary efforts to work with the G.O.P. on this legislation, Republicans won’t support the bill for a variety of reasons. As Politico notes:

With most moderates having retired or been defeated, especially among House Republicans, there is little political danger in opposing nearly another trillion dollars in spending at a time when many conservative-leaning voters are weary of government intervention after months of bailouts.

In other words, the moderates — those Republicans who would have been most tempted to support the bill — were replaced with Democrats in the last election.

Furthermore, Republicans understand that in order for their party to return to power anytime soon, Obama must not go down in history as a phenomenally successful president; and this means they cannot hand Obama a massive political victory in the first weeks of his presidency. In his final column for the New York Times, Conservative columnist William Kristol correctly identifies the significance of Obama’s fortunes. He begins by acknowledging (proclaiming?) that a conservative era in American politics that began with Ronald Reagan has ended. Then, he considers whether the new era will be a liberal one:

The answer lies in the hands of one man: the 44th president. If Reagan’s policies had failed, or if he hadn’t been politically successful, the conservative ascendancy would have been nipped in the bud. So with President Obama today. Liberalism’s fate rests to an astonishing degree on his shoulders. If he governs successfully, we’re in a new political era. If not, the country will be open to new conservative alternatives.

I believe Kristol is right: If Obama is seen as a successful president, it will not only empower him to make significant progress in implementing his agenda throughout his eight years in office — it will also set the stage for Democratic dominance of American politics for a generation. Which is not what the uber-conservative Republicans want at all. So they can’t acknowledge that Obama’s plan is good for the country.

Finally, it seems that many conservatives honestly don’t think the stimulus bill will work. Consider the following reporting from Politico:

Obama’s soothing tones Tuesday couldn’t mask his disagreement with Republicans on the need for more tax cuts in the package. That was the first question he took in his meeting on the House side — and Obama brushed it away with a polite, but firm, no thanks.

“Feel free to whack me over the head because I probably will not compromise on that part,” Obama said of Republican opposition to the Democrats’ refundable tax credits, according to two sources in the room.

Finger-pointing aside, that partisan reality gets at why the relationship is fraying: irreconcilable differences.

“It lasted about two days,” quipped Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), when asked if the honeymoon was over.

Why so soon?

Because, he said, conservatives are just “not receptive” to Obama’s agenda.

Yet even Inhofe, a true-believing conservative who represents a state in which Obama lost every county, is unwilling to take after his former colleague.

“He is very likable, he presented himself very well, and he seemed to want to be inclusive,” Inhofe said in a brief interview following Obama’s meeting. “But if the product is anything like we think it’s going to be, it’s not one that is going to be sellable to conservatives.”

In other words, a lot of Republicans will oppose the bill because it’s just not what conservatives want to do. That’s American democracy.

For all of these reasons, Republicans won’t give Obama the “bipartisan” support he is looking for. Nevertheless, the bill will pass — and then Obama’s political fortunes will rise or fall based on how effectively the bill turns our country’s economic frown upside-down. Of course, not long after the bill passes — maybe a few months later, maybe six months later — Republicans will argue that the bill was a dismal failure, and Democrats will argue that the bill was a smashing success. I believe this is basically the debate that will determine whether Congressional Democrats keep their majorities in Congress in 2010.

So lets hope the bill is a success, for the sake of the millions of Americans who will benefit from a strong economy, and for the sake of the millions of Americans who will benefit from another two years of Democratic governance.

So if Obama is doomed to fail in his efforts to win lots of yes votes from both parties on his stimulus bill, what is the point of all his extraordinary ”reaching out” to Republicans? All right, all right, perhaps calling it “extraordinary” is over-the-top. The media uses the word “rare.” As in:

Obama’s trip to Capitol Hill was rare for a sitting president, especially given his decision to meet only with the opposition. He met with Democratic lawmakers earlier this month.

                                                               -  The Washington Post

A week after being sworn into office, Mr. Obama returned to the Capitol for the first of what his advisers said would be frequent visits with members of Congress. Yet it was still a rare event for a president, particularly a Democratic one, to sit down with the entire Republican conference. …

It was far too early to say whether Mr. Obama’s visit to Capitol Hill would attract any more Republican votes for the economic recovery plan that is scheduled to be considered on Wednesday in the House. But officials from both sides said it was the beginning of a dialogue between Congressional Republicans and the White House that did not exist even when George W. Bush was in the Oval Office.

                                                                -  The New York Times

The rare trip by a president to Capitol Hill revealed the urgency in Congress and the White House over a cure for the souring economy

                                                                          –  The Wall Street Journal

So the Washington press corps seems to agree that Obama’s visit with Congressional Republicans was “rare.” It is also worth noting that his visit effectively compelled a number of Republicans to say nice things about him. Consider this from the L.A. Times:

Despite their opposition to the stimulus plan, many House Republicans came away from their meeting with Obama saying the president had impressively laid the groundwork for future cooperation.

“I thought it was a great gesture on his part and it begins a dialogue,” (Rep. Paul D. Ryan, R-Wis) said. “He did a good job starting us off, at least, beginning to talk to one another. And that will help him in the future.”

And this from the New York Times:

Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, the House Republican leader, said after the meeting that significant philosophical differences remained between the president and the Republicans, but they also agreed on several fronts. The mere fact of the meeting, he said, was an early sign of a willingness by the White House to solicit input from all sides.

“We both share a sincere belief that we have to have a plan that works, that will revive our economy, create jobs and help preserve jobs in our country,” Mr. Boehner said. “I think our members enjoyed the conversation. I think the president enjoyed the conversation. I look forward to continuing to work with him to improve this package.”         

And this from Politico:

Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), one of the House Republicans on Obama’s target list, lavished praise on the president for coming to visit in an interview after the lunch. But she indicated she was still uncertain if she could reward his effort.

“Do we need a stimulus? I believe we do. But do we need to spend the amount that were spending? I’m not convinced of that.”

Rep. Judy Biggert (R-Ill.), asked if any of her colleagues were more inclined to support the stimulus measure after their back and forth with Obama, was more blunt: “I don’t think so.”

Of course, she didn’t want to place the blame at the president’s feet.

“It’s unfortunate that their leadership didn’t negotiate with us,” Biggert said. “The problem is that the process now is too far down the road.”

But, with a twinkle, she said, “he really cares about what he’s doing.”

Obama is “sincere.” He is “laying the groundwork for future cooperation.” He “did a good job” getting them to “talk to one another.” He has a “willingness” to “solicit input from all sides.” He “presented himself very well, and seemed to want to be inclusive.” He “really cares about what he’s doing.”

I don’t know what all this praise means, but it will be interesting to see how many of these same Republicans are willing to support nasty campaign ads against Obama in four years. It may be that Obama is actually setting a new tone in Washington — and setting a new precedent against with all future presidents will be judged in their treatment of members of Congress.

UPDATE: It appears the bill may win at least one Republican Senator’s vote, according to this report from a Politico article released tonight:

Rising above the fray Tuesday — but almost omnipresent — was Obama himself, meeting with rank-and-file House and Senate Republicans and making his case that the floor votes ahead are just the first steps in a larger action plan to address financial regulations, home foreclosures and banks teetering near insolvency.

“His presentation was a tour de force,” New Hampshire Sen. Judd Gregg told Politico. The top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, Gregg has been an outspoken critic of the level of new spending in the administration’s plan but said: “I felt much better. … He’s clearly moving forward aggressively on all the different fronts. I was very impressed. If he puts it in the context of an integrated effort, I’d consider it.”

Now why didn’t George W. Bush meet with rank-and-file Democrats and impress them with his “tour de force” presentations about his overall strategy in the War on Terror?

I guess we’ll never know.