At a press conference this morning, Speaker Pelosi quite eloquently made clear that words in Washington mean a great deal:
“You have to see the language…Around here language means a lot. Words weigh a ton and one person’s understanding of a spoken description might vary from another’s.”
The Speaker is absolutely right. After all the fuss over a “stimulus”, how many of us can actually say what that means? We’re told it is a combination of tax cuts and spending. We’re told it will jump start the economy. And yet important details such as why it will take up to two years before much of the spending kicks in goes summarily ignored. Or that somehow the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has calculated that spending is more than $100 billion higher than Democrats have claimed (1/3 of the total package).
Do we need a stimulus? Absolutely–and urgently. Is this the package we need? In my mind, no way. This package represents 819 billion ways to saddle us all with so much irresponsible debt that we won’t even be able to dream of a better future for years to come.
Speaker Pelosi should realize that words mean a lot outside of Washington as well. We want real reform and substantive economic policy — not just hot air, empty promises, and doublespeak words that mean little more in substance than another sound byte to encourage another election win for you. For starters, cut the hundreds of billion in pork and inconclusively vague descriptions of how funds will be spent. Then, we can all begin to have a public debate about “stimulus”.
The Washington Post has published an excellent visual that shows exactly how the “stimulus” package will be spent:
