President Obama Defending the Indefensible
When President Obama held his Monday night press conference, he made a point to say that the bill didn’t contain earmarks. Technically, he was telling the truth. In effect, though, nothing could be further from the truth. The stimulus bill is nothing but pork. This article is proof that there’s alot of pork in this bill:
The federal government is preparing to spend millions to purchase a fleet of small electric vehicles that critics compare to golf carts.
The $838 billion economic stimulus bill that passed the Senate yesterday contains $300 million for the government to purchase a fleet of “green” cars. But the money won’t just go to buy fuel-efficient hybrids such as the Ford Escape or Chevy Volt.
The cash also can be used to purchase “neighborhood electric vehicles.” The NEVs, which resemble streamlined golf carts, scoot at up to 25 mph, operate on battery power and can be plugged into 110-volt outlets for charging.
Spending hundreds of millions of dollars on updating the federal fleet to green cars is bad enough. Spending $300,000,000 on cars and NEVs is inexcusable.
By pushing this bill as it’s written, President Obama is defending the indefensible. Many of the things that aren’t pork in this bill will have limited impact of lifting the economy out of recession.
If President Obama’s focus was on passing legislation that lifted the economy out of recession, this legislation’s pricetag would be much cheaper. Instead, he’s focused on paying off as many Democratic allies as possible with this legislation.
President Obama can tout the fact that there aren’t any earmarks in this bill but he knows that he’d be laughed at if he claimed that there isn’t any pork in the legislation.
If President Obama wants to defend the indefensible, we should prepare to cite specific items in this legislation that tell voters how President Obama, Speaker Pelosi and Harry Reid are wasting money and paying off their political allies with their money.
Technorati Tags: Pork, Stimulus Package, Golf Carts, Earmarks, Ford Escape, Chevy Volt, Political Payoffs, President Obama, nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Democrats
Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog
February 13th, 2009 at 12:39 pm
Electric cars are an excellent component of conservation that Republicans and Democrats have endorsed. I know because I have one. Electric cars produce a fraction of the pollution of ICE cars without burning gasoline. This is a three-pronged boost for our economy, our environment and for business. Electric cars are also a hope for a new economy. How can you criticize this when the powerful oil/auto lobby have fought any sort of innovation towards electric cars for decades? Or would you rather that Americans keep driving big gas guzzlers, because that is what will happen if government doesn’t offer some incentive in the face of our rampant oil consumption. NEVs are especially important because they are an inexpensive addition to people’s transportation mix and studies show that they will use these the vast majority of the time compared to their gas car. Do more research, take a test-drive because this is something that will help government and individuals.