The Numbers Game

Anyone who has followed the ongoing development and debate over the near trillion dollar stimulus plan that the Democrats have put together, knows that, from day to day, the numbers and projections keep changing. Last week, the Pelosi-gang was talking about $750 billion dollars. Now, its up $816 billion which is over 8 percent more than before. Also, last week, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reported that only about 40 percent of that money would actually make it into our economy within two years (See Full Story). In my opinion, that's not kick-starting anything. Our Democratic friends in Congress apparently have never heard the expression "Rome wasn't built in a day." Neither are roads, or bridges, or wind farms, or solar power arrays. The planning process takes time. Then there are the required months of EPA environmental studies, approvals, and contractor bids to be had before a single speck of asphalt or cement can be laid. Once the actual construction starts, it could be months to years before completion. That's why the actual creation of jobs would be too slow to effectively return this economy to good health. Something I've been saying all along.

Upset with the 40 percent number, dear Nancy (Pelosi) told the new Congressional Budget Office to again review the previous CBO work and come up with a new number. This time, the number jumped to a 64% completion rate within two years (See Full Story). So much for independent accounting. At the same time, the Office Of Management and Budgets (OMB) did their look-see at the stimulus package and they said only 49 percent of the infrastructure building would be completed within two years.

Even the 200 million that Nancy wanted in the "birth control" portion of the bill probably wouldn't have been spent in the first year "unless" those family planning agencies started handing out condoms by the case and gave out two-year supplies of birth control pills. Maybe we should have a national advertising campaign to promote premarital sex so that the money would be used up faster. That would put even more stimulus in this stimulus part of this stimulus package now wouldn't it? Dear Nancy could be the spokesperson. I can't imagine what advertising slogan they would come up with that would somehow say that having more safe-sex will save our economy; but, I'm sure Nancy could come up with one.

I don't know what the real number on actual spending will ultimately be. But, I am quite sure it won't be as effective as this Congress seems to think in putting people back to work. Plain and simple, it is a political stimulus package to buy votes and pay those back who voted Democratic last year, and not hardly the economic stimulus package that would help put an end the recession. In my simple way of looking at things, I would think that if only 50 percent of the stuff in the package will actually be applied within 2 years, then let's cut out the stuff that won't. To me, it makes perfect sense that the stimulus package should only be $400 billion. The rest is just waste and pet-pork projects of the Democrats.

The other thing that came out this last week was the fact that the original $750 billion in spending will really amount to $1.1 or $1.2 trillion after the interest is applied to that debt. So, roughly speaking, every dollar that our Congress and the Obama Administration talks about is, in reality, about 50% more when future interest payments are added on. Of course, that interest will continue to be paid as long as we still have a national debt. And, since I can't remember when we didn't have a national debt, I suspect we will be paying that interest forever. Just my opinion.