The Audacity of Speaker Pelosi

As a Representative in Congress, Nancy Pelosi has a California congressional district as her constituency. But as Speaker of the House, she represents the entire United States. In that regard, she owes it to the overall population to show some consideration for what we, the people, want.

The Stimulus America Wants

The American People Want a Stimulus Bill that looks like a stimulus bill:

Build up the Nation’s Roads and Bridges.

Fund Prizes for Green Energy Initiatives, such as solar power and high-mileage vehicles.

Commuter-Rail Projects, prohibitively expensive in the near-term, look like the only control on the cancer-like spread of the automobile. What better opportunity to get these projects underway than at a time when our need for jobs temporarily overshadows our desire to balance the national budget?

These Are Stimulus Programs That Put People to Work, and which will pay off unarguably over the decades ahead.

Why Then Did the Democratic-led Congress put forth a package filled with the kind of things that brought on the Republican revolution in the first place, back in the day?

Speaker Pelosi, Then

In Seeking an Answer to the Partisan Nature of the House’s Stimulus Package, we need look no further than to Nancy Pelosi's behavior during last summer’s wrangling over the TARP bailout plan. Anyone who remembers Speaker Pelosi’s impassioned, anti-Bush Administration speech just before the vote will remember the sense of anger and dismay that her speech created.

There, at a Time When Congress Struggled to set politics aside and unite in a rescue plan for the Nation’s economy, Speaker Pelosi rubbed Republican faces in it. By her speech, she enmeshed a vote for the rescue bill with a vote against the sitting Republican President.

Nancy Pelosi’s Speech Said, in effect, that a vote for the bill was a vote against the President. Small wonder then that the Republicans turned about-face and voted against the bill.

One Would Hope That Speaker Pelosi Would Have Learned Something from That. That maybe her political “tin ear” would have gotten the message.

Speaker Pelosi, Now

But Apparently It Did Not. Speaker Pelosi’s ear remains as tin-filled now as it was back then. For here we are, at the dawn of a new era in American politics, one in which the needs of the American nation are to be served, rather than the needs of the politicians in Washington.

The Bill That the House Just Passed Without a Single Republican Vote has only a small percentage of its costs going to the kind of programs that Americans of both Left and Right can agree on as appropriate to the role government plays in securing our national infrastructure.

Too Many Liberal Programs

But Too Many of the Programs, which stand out in media reports, concern dubious and even controversial programs:

A Program to Assist in Family Planning, including contraception.

A Program to Re-Sod the Capitol Mall, following 1.8 million pairs of feet trod over it for the recent inauguration.

A Program to Fund the National Endowment for the Arts.

What America Needs from Its Government—

People Across America Are Frightened for Their Jobs. Americans are frightened that they may well lose their homes. We are united in a desire to put the resources of government to work at getting us working again.

The American People Are United in a desire to see the new, bi-partisan, post-ideological era of strong government lead us forward into the twenty-first century—

—versus What the House of Representatives Wants

But the United States House of Representatives, under House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, wants to rekindle the fires of bipartisan government and Liberal ideology, and lead us back into the swamp again. Both sides of the aisle seem determined to continue the "business as usual" that continually disappoints the potential of the American system of government.

Last Week We Took Aim at the House Republicans, whose blind-siding of the American people displayed a disheartening “Audacity of Disdain” for the wishes of the American people.

Today We Take Aim at the House Democrats, whose attempted hijacking of the anti-Conservative mandate delivered in the last election have now displayed, for all to see, the audacity of the Democrats.

The Audacity of Nancy Pelosi.

Sentimental Value Is Not Lost on Us: What Does Your Insurance Company Do For You?

Recently We Received This Piece of Advertising Mail from a familiar source. In a previous era, we would not have thought much about it at all. But now that we all seem to be investors in this insurance company deemed to be absolutely essential to the well-being of the world financial markets, it was a hard advertising pitch to ignore.

“Sentimental Value is Not Lost on Us,” either. We never knew that $152,000,000,000 of our money could touch our hearts so deeply.

And As for the Big Question that that big, ol' sentimental insurance giant, AIG, asks us in that blue picture up at the top of the page—

Well, It May Be Best if we just keep our comments to ourselves.

Fool Me Thrice?

We Are Not Fans, generally speaking, of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. In particular, we remember her untimely partisan remarks during the first vote on what ultimately became the Troubled Assets Relief Program [TARP].

But:

We Would like to Offer up Our Compliments for her leadership at yesterday’s press conference concerning a proposed additional bailout of America’s Big 3 automakers. (These automakers, as you probably know, have come to Congress asking for another $3,000,000,000 of taxpayer money, with a promise that this time, the solvency-rescue deal might possibly work.)

Following Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s two previous and powerfully urgent appeals for taxpayer handouts—the “bazooka versus squirt gun” incident and the recent TARP “rescue”—Congress now is finally getting wise.

“Until They Show Us the Plan,” said Speaker Pelosi at the press conference, “We cannot show them the money.”

What a Relief It Was to Hear That.

This Congressional Recalcitrance Harkens Back to the early days of the Bush administration, of course, when President George W. Bush famously said, “Fool me once: shame on you. You fool me: we can’t get fooled again.”

You Really Ought to Look at This, which sheds a lighter humor on the currently dark economic situation:

Some Foolish George Bush Moments

It Is Never Clear Whether our lame-duck president has learned any such “fool me twice” lessons. But at least someone apparently has....

America Currently Has a Lame-Duck Presidency, a lame-duck Congress, and a lame balance in the Treasury. The auto industry will probably get its money—and probably it should, if only to retard our downward economic spiral for a while. Maybe by slowing things a bit, the recession heading down may be passed by the next economy recovery, going up.

And If That Next Recovery Doesn’t Come Soon-Enough, then the American auto industry, as well as the general American public, may descend into insolvency anyway.

So: the Auto Industry and We, the People, may be inherently broke. But at least for now—

We’ve Still Got Our Hands on That Three-Billion Dollars!

And We Can Say Thanks to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and the rest of the American Congress for that.