reason reviews the “stimulus”

From Reason mag’s original analysis by Veronique de Rugy:

There are many more bad policies and spending decisions in the Senate stimulus bill, but even a cursory glance at the parts outlined above give a good sense of the overall legislation—and what is likely to be signed into law by President Obama.

And here is one more thing to consider: There is absolutely no evidence that any stimulus package in the past 80 years has goosed economic activity—not FDR’s during the Great Depression, not Japan’s during the 1990s, and not George W. Bush’s in 2001 and 2008. If anything, the economic evidence suggests that such spending packages actually intensified and prolonged misery.

Instead of rushing through legislation that will likely have no short-term effect on the economy, is guaranteed to have negative long term ones, and that serves the traditional interest groups that politicians are always busy catering to, the Senate should have cut spending like Ireland is now doing and cut marginal tax rates across the board. That would not only have stimulated the economy, it would have been fiscally responsible considering the massive entitlement crisis that is coming our way. But such legislation, alas, will have to wait for another day. Or another crisis.

Her analysis on the final bill is here, appropriately subtitled “The final stimulus package is the final insult to taxpayers.”

rasmussen

67% Say They Could Do A Better Job On The Economy Than Congress, and 44% believe that “a group of people selected at random from the phone book would do a better job addressing the nation’s problems than the current Congress”, according to the latest Rasmussen poll.   I suppose you can make polls say whatever you want them to say, but those numbers don’t look like a vote of confidence in the stimulus / porkulus bill.

Another Rasmussen poll: 62% Want Stimulus Plan to Have More Tax Cuts, Less Spending.

It’s clear to me which side the American people support in the stimulus battle.