The Stimulus Package: What They Are Not Telling Us

President Barack Obama, accompanied by White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs,
waves. The $819 billion stimulus bill passed the House 244 to 188, but not a single Republican voted for it.

President Barack Obama, accompanied by White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, right, waves on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2009, before he spoke to reporters between his meetings with House and Senate Republicans. Despite visiting Republicans in Congress and stripping out two provisions the GOP objected to, President Obama is expected to win his House vote for his economic stimulus plan today without any significant Republican support.

"If there is somebody who is disgruntled, so be it...Republicans are talking about process. I think when you lose the argument on substance, on policy, what do you do? You talk about process and you talk about personality." --House Speaker Nancy Pelosi

Listen up. Because some of you have been e-mailing about the stimulus package, the daddy is going to step away from celebrating Black History Month and outline his view.

So where has Obama failed and where has he succeeded?

1. President Obama failed in two ways. First, he failed by promoting the notion of bi-partisanship over the economy. So, when not a single Republican voted for the passage of the stimulus package, some pundits saw it as a failure, when, in fact, it was a success. They got the votes they needed. Now, when he gets the stimulus plan passed in the senate soon, maybe this week, pundits are going to say, "Yeah, but he only got 3 or 4 Republicans to go along with him. It wasn't bi-partisan". But bi-partisanship is not a goal so much as a dynamic, never-ending process. The goal is to pass the stimulus plan.
2. President Obama failed by first negotiating with himself. He began by putting too much tax cuts: about $300 billion, I believe. This only caused Republicans to sharpen their knives and try to get more. he should have started at $200 billion, placing that other $100 billion in infrastructure.
3. President Obama developed good strategies to get the stimulus packaged passed, but he has not thought more broadly about how to make it work. For example, rather than give money to banks that were part of the problem in the first place, banks with the same CEOs running it, why not start up the government's own public bank? Why not appoint people to run this bank whom we can trust, people were not associated with banks that failed?

Why not use this new public bank to deal with foreclosures and to ensure that money is loaned to small businesses and for start-up businesses on main street? So President Obama, former community organizer, remember this: Over fifty years ago, Jackie Robinson started a bank in Harlem with very little money, crumbs compared to what you have. If he could do it about fifty years ago, why can't you do it now?

So where did President Obama succeed?

1. President Obama has succeeded in fulfilling many of the promises he talked about in his campaign, such as doing more to correct the inequity in pay to women. His signing of the Ledbetter Fair Pay Act was not just a bow to labor, which supported his candidacy. It was the right thing to do; and it should have been a long time ago. His signing a bill to help third world countries get funding for family planning was another good example. His hiring of women, women of color, people of color in general, at all levels of government, is noteworthy.
2. Though his staff did not vet closely some folks with tax problems, and though neither Gov. Dean nor Senator Kerry was appointed to cabinet-level positions, overall, President Obama has hired good people for the cabinet.
3. President Obama has been true to his desire to change the tone in the beltway by putting practicality and bi-partisanship over ideology and party loyalty. Frankly, this is a significant reason he is the best president for our times. Ultimately, he will not change the climate in Washington, but he may change it enough to get some important legislation passed during his presidency.

What about Republicans?

More than President Obama, it is Republicans in Washington who are practicing party politics and failing this country at a time when bi-partisanship and a spirit of cooperation is needed the most. For example, after Democrats and Republicans complained that enough was in the stimulus package for infrastructure, the Obama tried to put $20 additional billions in the budget, and Republicans rejected it because the budget was just too huge. Of course they need said this President Bush was getting us into debt. And, as the daddy recalls, this was on the same day that a report came out saying about 600,000 Americans had lost their jobs in January.

The daddy sees four things happening here:

1. Republicans have failed because they have no plans. Their idea of cutting taxes was a failure under Bush and, for that matter, under Reagan, which is why he raised taxes in his second term.
2. Republicans have failed because they have no plans to help middle and low-income people. Telling people to get private accounts when they don't have jobs is silly. Telling people to rely on tax cuts when they don't have a job or health insurance is idiotic. What these ideas demonstrate is that Republicans have no sympathy or empathy for middle and low-income Americans-- that they can't get past super individualistic ideology to a job plan and a safety net for those less fortunate than they.

And though they want say it publicly, what they resent more than anything are the sums in the stimulus that goes out for the poor: the $300 per person for those on social security; the extended unemployment insurance; the additional amounts for those on welfare, even the tax cuts for small businesses (as opposed to large corporations, their true friends for whom they make work after leaving congress). Kanye West said last year that President George Bush hated black people. No, Kanye. President Bush and the Republican party hate poor people.
3. Because they have no real plans, because they don't care about poor people anyway, the Republican party is failing this nation by engaging in obstructionist politics to the bone. What else do they have? They've lost ideologically: the Reagan revolution is over it. President Bush lost it. Now, they only have a strategy of obstruction until they can find something new or repackage. So they fight on against ideas by Obama (good or bad), hoping to stall him long enough until the 2012 presidential elections.
4. Beneath party politics and a failed Reagan ideology of government as enemy, the Republican party has failed the American people by continuing the discussion of race. The real deal is that it is not just filthy-mouth right-wing radio talk show host Limbaugh who wants Obama to fail. Most Republicans and many white Americans who listen to them want him to fail as well. They say "How dare this upstart, this skinny black guy with the big ears run for president of our country? How dare he and other democrats promote these socialist causes equality for women, and those tree huggers? How dare they work with that Nancy Pelosi and those San Francisco liberals {gays} and communists (anyone with a trace of progressive in them, like that economist Paul Krugman of the New York Times).

But no pundits, right or left, will say that publically. Nonetheless, this dirty secret is what helps pompous, right wing idiots and drug addicts like Limbaugh and Savage on radio and right-wing-milk-the-kool aid-drinker preachers continue to hold sway over a still-powerful Republican base. They are the ones holding together what’s left of a Republican party. That’s why you couldn’t get more than one or two Republican senators or legislators to criticize Limbaugh for saying he wants Obama and administration to fail, a truly un-American thing
to say.

President Obama has made some mistakes. But it's the Republican party which continues to fail the American people the most. For President Obama to succeed in his first term, he will need liberal, progressive or regular down-home folk to support him beat back the forces who only want change on terms that benefit themselves, other Republicans and their rich friends the most.
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Note: Don't forget to check out the photos on my sidebar of black leaders who made a
difference in moving this country closer to a just land.