FDR Spent Too Little: Obama

[Kathianne]

Ok, perhaps a glimpse of what we'll see in the future regarding the bailout money:

http://media.nationalreview.com/post...M5YTljZDZkNDk=

Obama Explains FDR's Folly? [Guy Benson]
Congressman Frank Lucas (R-OK) offered KNID radio an illuminating glimpse into President Obama's much-discussed stimulus pep talk with House Republicans. According to Lucas, Obama expressed his belief during the meeting that a major problem with FDR's New Deal is that it didn't spend enough money in the early going. Here's a partial transcript of the congressman's interview:

“The president offered a comment in the conference the other day. He said that the spending program that President Roosevelt used in the beginning of the depression – the real problem was that Roosevelt slowed down on public spending in the first two years. If he’d just kept on spending that money, we’d have gotten out of the depression quicker…

I think [that’s] an indication of what’s coming. Maybe not just an $825 Billion increase in the national debt for additional spending this year, but if the economy continues to sag over the course of the year, don’t be surprised—based on his comment about the 1930s—if President Obama [proposes] another increase in the national debt and another big spending package after this.”

In other words, Obama thinks FDR's plan was a laudable start, but ultimately faltered because it didn't spend more money, sooner. I haven't seen similar accounts of Obama's remarks reported elsewhere, but if Lucas' recollection is accurate, shouldn't these comments be alarming to skeptics of the current stimulus package? ...

[bullypulpit]

Economists, including Nobel laureate Paul Krugman, are saying $825 billion should be the floor, not the ceiling, for spending to stabilize the economy.

But one can only wonder where all these fiscally conservative Republicans were when Bush was in office. They never saw a spending bill they didn't like. And as long as they could borrow the money needed to fund the war in Iraq, instead of RAISING TAXES to pay for it which would have been the fiscally responsible thing to do, they didn't seem too worried about saddling future generations with mountains of debt.

The hypocrisy on the part of congressional Republicans is monumental, and they continue to display a wanton disregard, even a complete disconnect, from the American mainstream. They keep proposing the same worn out, failed policies they advocated under Bush despite the fact that Americans, as evidenced by the election in November, want to take a different course.

BTW, have you ever noticed that Rep. John Boehner's (R-OH) eyes always look like they've been pickled overnight in gin?

[bullypulpit]

[bullypulpit]

bump!

[PostmodernProphet]

But one can only wonder where all these fiscally conservative Republicans were when Bush was in office.

can't argue with that....they obviously WEREN'T acting like fiscally conservative Republicans while Bush was in office.....they were acting like Democrats....that's why they lost seats in 06 and 08......

[Little-Acorn]

This is, of course, the classic liberal response when confronted with the fact that his liberal programs didn't deliver the good that had been advertised: "Well, we weren't liberal enough!!!"

It has been offered after virtually every socialistic program ever tried... because, inevitably, such programs NEVER succeed.

Looks like we're going to try it again, now that Republicans don't have enough votes (and in many cases, not enough spine) to stop it.

Hopefully people will begin to notice the pattern here, after this attempt to "be even more liberal" flops like its predecessors.

And hopefully we'll still have a country to salvage after the coming flop.

[bullypulpit]

This is, of course, the classic liberal response when confronted with the fact that his liberal programs didn't deliver the good that had been advertised: "Well, we weren't liberal enough!!!"

It has been offered after virtually every socialistic program ever tried... because, inevitably, such programs NEVER succeed.

Looks like we're going to try it again, now that Republicans don't have enough votes (and in many cases, not enough spine) to stop it.

Hopefully people will begin to notice the pattern here, after this attempt to "be even more liberal" flops like its predecessors.

And hopefully we'll still have a country to salvage after the coming flop.

See <a href= http://www.debatepolicy.com/showpost.php?p=343987&postcount=2>Rush Limbaugh's Stimulus Plan, Post #2</a> in refutation of the GOP tax-cut strategy...You know the one the Bush administration followed and helped to bankrupt the nation. Keynesian economics beats the hell out of Freidman's Chicago school economics hands down.