Trouble in the Stimulus Bill

For the last eight long years we have watched the effects of trickle down economics fail in our nation as the rich were enriched by tax cuts and everyone else suffered. Now we face an economy on the very brink of disaster with a Democratic administration and Congress. One would think this combination would bring a new and better approach to restarting the nation.

Instead we get a stimulus bill in the Senate pared down far enough to be ineffective to begin with and then pared even farther and focused more on tax cuts than before. All today is in the name of satisfying the center and right of American politics instead of focusing on what is best for the nation as a whole.

What the Senate cut:

Billion dollar cuts

$40 billion State Fiscal Stabilization

$16 billion School Construction

$7.5 billion of State Incentive Grants

$5.8 billion Health Prevention Activity

$4.5 billion GSA

$3.5 billion Higher Ed Construction (Eliminated)

$3.5 billion Federal Bldgs Greening

$2.25 Neighborhood Stabilization (Eliminate)

$2 billion broadband

$2 billion HIT Grants

$1.25 billion project based rental

$1 billion Head Start/Early Start

$1.2 billion in Retrofiting Project 8 Housing

$1 billion Energy Loan Guarantees

Million dollar cuts

$100 million FSA modernization

$50 million CSERES Research

$65 million Watershed Rehab

$30 million SD Salaries

$100 Distance Learning

$98 million School Nutrition

$50 million aquaculture

$100 million NIST

$100 million NOAA

$100 million Law Enforcement Wireless

$50 million Detention Trustee

$25 million Marshalls Construction

$100 million FBI Construction

$300 million Federal Prisons

$300 million BYRNE Formula

$140 million BYRNE Competitive

$10 million State and Local Law Enforcement

$50 million NASA

$50 million Aeronautics

$50 million Exploration

$50 million Cross Agency Support

$200 million NSF

$100 million Science

$300 million Fed Hybrid Vehicles

$50 million from DHS

$200 million TSA

$122 million for Coast Guard Cutters, modifies use

$25 million Fish and Wildlife

$55 million Historic Preservation

$20 million working capital fund

$200 million Superfund

$165 million Forest Svc Capital Improvement

$90 million State & Private Wildlife Fire Management

$75 million Smithsonian

$600 million Title I (NCLB)

Most cuts were to education, the environment, and people oriented programs with direct benefits. The parts left out would have meant an immediate infusion of government monies into the economy. This is the approach proven long ago to work. Government is the only body able to spend today. We must support government at all levels.

A real stimulus package would include support for state and local governments ready to continue programs already in place. Tax cuts have been shown more than once to be no way to move the economy forward. Instead of cuts we need restoration of the Bush tax cuts to bring more money into the government coffers and therefore to allow a more reasonable spending package to be a real stimulus.

We elected President Obama and a Democratic Congress to see real change. And now it seems we get more of the same old same old. The time for real protest has come. We, the people, need to be heard loud and clear. Our Senators and Representative need to know we are watching and that we care. Let them know we need Democrats who act like Democrats, not Democrats acting like moderate Republicans.

Contact our elected officials:
Senator Ted Kauffman
E-mail
Phone: (302) 573-6345 or (302) 424-8090

Senator Tom Carper
E-mail
Phone: (302) 573-6291
Fax: (302) 573-6434

Representative Mike Castle
E-mail
Phone: 302.428.1902
Fax: 302.428.1950

Local office numbers and fax machines are often best as the DC lines may be tied up these days. E-mail works, too. Be sure to personalize your message. Tell your own story. Don't let these guys think for one single second we, the voting public, are asleep at the wheel.

Peace.