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The Spectacle Blog
With the monumental failure of Obama’s “jobs” bill (actually just a checklist of liberal agenda items under the pretense of jobs), Democrats have decided to break the bill out into a few separate smaller spending measures. First on the list: direct bailouts of mismanaged state budgets.
The new measure is a $35 billion aid package to state and local governments to help them avoid layoffs of teachers, police officers and firefighters. It’s virtually certain to be blocked by Republicans opposed to spending money to boost the economy.
Direct aid to the states is a very popular measure, but it’s unlikely to do much good and amounts to little more than a way to use taxpayer money to preserve government union jobs. Moreover, as the Wall Street Journal reports, spending at the state level has done little good.
Remember how $200 billion in federal stimulus cash was supposed to save the states from fiscal calamity? Well, hold on to your paychecks, because a big story of 2010 will be how all that free money has set the states up for an even bigger mess this year and into the future… Ten states have a deficit, relative to the size of their expenditures, as bleak as that of near-bankrupt California. The Golden State starts the year another $6 billion in arrears despite a large income and sales tax hike last year. New York is literally down to its last dollar. Revenues are down, to be sure, but in several ways the stimulus has also made things worse.
Hold on to your wallets, folks. As the Democrats parse out their spending bill into smaller, more popular legislation, there’s a greater chance your money will be thrown down the giant money hole of useless federal spending.
View all comments (11) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by Kevin Glass
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LiveFreeOrDie| 10.18.11 @ 1:49PM
Well of course the states are still in trouble as policy didn't change except for raising taxes and "fees" for anything they could dream up. Saving a state from bankruptcy MIGHT be a good idea as long as there are strings attached requiring the state to put it's house in order, balanced budget perhaps? Dump 6 billion on California tomorrow and by this time next year they will be right back where they started, billions in the red.
LiveFreeOrDie| 10.18.11 @ 1:56PM
By the way, I like the bills broken up into pieces and not sure why that's such a bad thing. Single issue bills should be the norm. I'm weary of multi-thousand page "packages" where not even the people voting and promoting them can possibly understand them in their entirety.
Al Adab| 10.18.11 @ 4:00PM
LFOD:
There is both a positive side and negative side to this approach. As you note bills should stand alone and non-germain riders prohibited. Each vote should be one of recoord up or down.
That said, from history we remember that the "Compromise of 1850" comprised nine bills which when conbined had no chance of passage. Broken out each bill found a majority but none of them had the same majority. In that instance the nation benefited albeit for a short time only, but today the emergence of the statist hard Left in control of the agenda is a danger. If, by breaking their agenda down into small steps and finding different najorities to pass each one, they succeed then those small steps lead to the gallows for Liberty.
LiveFreeOrDie| 10.18.11 @ 4:15PM
I'm not sure I follow the "different majorities" as you explained it. It still has to be voted up/down so I'm not sure exactly how a single-issue bill would pass while if grouped with other legislation it would not. Seems like the opposite would be true. I think I'm missing something here...please beat me upside the head with whatever it is.
Al Adab| 10.19.11 @ 12:08AM
LFOD:
Hope you are still out there checking. For example the comptomise of 1850 included California statehood and fugitive slave law. There were seven other parts as well. If combined in one bill the votes were not there to pass it. Senators favoring the fugitive slave bill opposed CA statehood. So the majorities for each of the nine bills which all passed, contained different individual Senators for different provisions. Only a couple voted in favor or against every one. Henry Clay and John C. Calhoun combined to make it happen. It is considered their great achievement.
Joe| 10.18.11 @ 3:05PM
LOL, the Democrats have become the little kid in the candy store that comes up to mom with a new peice of candy after passing every jar. Mom, can you get this for me? Pleeeeaasse??? It's only 35 billion... NO! But MOOOOAAAHHHOOMM! China will lend it too us... Or we can just print it...
sjccoach| 10.18.11 @ 7:43PM
Let's see if the RINOs in Congress have the stones to vote these indivdual packages down. We are broke and don't have the money to spend.
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