Don't Let Republican Stubbornists Touch Your No No Spot on Tuesday

Just a reminder a few days before the election. Don't be fooled.

That will be hard for many people, who under the coordinated Republican onslaught of figmentations and outright nonsense are determined to oust Democrats and any politician connected to the evils associated with President Barrack Obama.  It amazes to see the number of people who are easily swayed every time they hear the words Pelosi, or Stimulus, or Obamacare.

It's like the holy trinity in reverse, invoked as damnation by knowing political operatives and naive political stooges alike.

Don't be fooled.

Let us talk about the stimulus for just sec. It's officially the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, and while the title borders on the grandiose, it cannot be dismissed and ridiculed in the manner that it has without some mental disconnect in a willfully stupid segment of the population that is intent on not eating its spinach, but perfectly comfortable in letting strange Republicans touch their no no spot.

The broad provisions of this $787 billion piece of legislation?

• $288 billion was allocated toward tax cuts, including $116 billion to individuals in the form of payroll tax credits. Throw into this amount child tax credits, unemployment tax exemptions, college and home buyer credits. $51 billion was directed toward businesses.

• $155.1 billion was directed toward health care related issues. This included an allocation of  $86.8 billion for Medicaid, $25 billion in Cobra subsidies for the unemployed, and various veteran related initiatives.

• $100 billion was aimed at education. $53.6 billion of this went toward local states and municipalities to prevent layoffs and maintain schools. The next highest allocations were toward expanding Pell Grants and increasing support for low income kids.

Let's pause a moment. Remember Jesus? A guy we all claim to love, and that conservatives claim an especially close relationship with? I recall him saying something like, "Suffer the little children to come unto me," which is really hard to do when they are sick, or can't read the map to find Jesus hang'in in Washington Square Park. And will they have the energy to pull themselves up to Jesus's lap by their stolen bootstraps? (Ah, I see your skepticism with that "Are there no prisons, no workhouses" face on your face).

• $82.2 billion was set aside for retirees, unemployed workers and low income workers. This amount included $40 billion to increase and expand unemployment benefits. Another $20 billion was cut out for food stamps, and $14.2 to give a few extra dollars to the old folks on Social Security. Additional funds went to such nonsense like "Meals on Wheels" and local food banks.

Clearly, and thus far, this Stimulus, this Stimuli, this beast of unnecessary legislation is pure horror and waste. According to some Republicans, many conservatives and virtually all Tea Partisans, the opposite of this bill was the better path. No state medicaid help. No unemployment benefit increase. No modernizing Defense Department facilities. No education funding. None of that crazy stuff, that wanton, lewd spending stuff.

The opposite. Because Stimulus is bad. Just saying it should make it's badness self evident. And unfortunately there is a large enough group of narrow thinkers out there who can buy into the rhetoric and see black as white, up as down, and their President as the evil democracy destroying trickster.

The above is only part of the American Recovery Act (the Stimulus). Wikipedia lists most of it, including the various portions allocated to infrastructure, scientific and technology investment, and rebuilding. We focused on the pure people part, because while you might argue that $100 million for upgraded National Guard facilities does not directly affect you, you cannot ignore the funding stimuli that raises your paycheck, or keeps your kid's teachers employed, or your neighbor from losing all while being laid off. (And mind you, these layoffs are coming at a time of huge corporate profits, so who is the real problem, government or the private sector?)

One could make the argument that you don't spend money you don't have, and that's often the argument being made by the critics of President Obama. But consistency is not a strong point in this line of reasoning when America's economic structural problems have been ongoing for many years. It is a strange world when a middle of the road centrist president can inspire such vocal and irrational opposition after the worst economic collapse in 75 years, and a collapse he had no hand in creating and made every effort to offset.

Don't be fooled, by fools.