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Wednesday Update

What we want to continue doing in some of these Wednesday Updates is begin to look at major events in the news in their larger historical context.... And maybe even how some things will be viewed in 50 years, 100 years or even 500 or 1000 years...

Subject: The Stimulus Plan of 2009

(Wed., February 18, 2009)

(approx. 2395 words, 5 pp.)

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Well, we got The Stimulus Plan, and given the hoopla surrounding it, there are obligatory comments I suppose...

President Obama has hailed The Stimulus Plan as the legislation that will define and guide America for a generation. Is that true? Quite possible. Quite possibly we will be talking about the successes and/or failures of this legislation not for the next 20 days, or even 20 weeks or months but the next 20 years.

The ironies of history?

There are a lot of ironies to history. The irony here with Obama’s Stimulus Plan is, of course, that it is not Obama’s Plan at all!!! Or, at least so we must assume. For example, would it have been much different if Hillary had been elected? Probably not. But more than that, indeed much more than that, it is not at all what Obama said he wanted. He wanted an infrastructure plan, primarily, he said over and over, and now even the mainstream media concedes that infrastructure is only a small part of the plan. Further, Obama wanted a bipartisan Plan not a bad idea, politically, just in case it does not work, but this Plan was one of the most partisan pieces of legislation ever.

And, finally, Obama wanted open discussion of the Plan, which was released after midnight and passed the next day. All of this was the last thing he wanted! None of this was Obama’s doing, I think we must assume, or he has been lying through his teeth to us for months on end, and I simply refuse to believe that about this apparently very honorable man, who apparently is being steam-rolled by the Democrat Congress? To treat the first President of color with such contempt is unspeakably outrageous?

Our wiretap on the President’s phone, in fact confirms our suspicions! Friday, February 13th, 2009 may be a day which will live in political if not economic infamy? On Friday at 2:00 AM President Obama was rudely awakened by a phone call from the House Speaker! "You, wake up! I mean, Mr. President, The Stimulus Plan just came out of conference and will be passed in the morning, and you will sign it next week! Do you hear me?" "Yes, Mistress Nancy!" "Are you going to kiss my high heel or what?" "Yes, Mistress Nancy!" "Master Harry will be calling you in a few minutes, and you will do what he says, do you understand me?" "But what about my infrastructure projects?" "Don’t talk back to me, you hear! Do you want me to rough you up, Mr. President?" "No, Mistress Nancy, no Mistress Nancy, don’t hit me again! Please, don’t hit me again, I’ll sign it! I’ll sign it next week!" This shameless behavior by the Democrat leadership is a disgrace to the Democrat Party and even the entire country, at least in my opinion.

Not "a flash in the pan," but Obama has "shot his wad"?

Will The Stimulus Plan work? Maybe, but there is now nothing to do for an act 2, regardless, because the President has "shot his wad" for the next four years? Back in the days of muzzle-loading rifles "a flash in the pan" was just that, only a flash of the powder in the pan but not igniting the powder to shoot the bullet. However, The Stimulus Plan is very real and not a flash in the pan! But when the muzzle-loader did fire its single shot held in the barrel by a wad of material, then it was said that you had "shot your wad," that is, your one shot. That is all the rifle had, and that is, in essence, what this almost 800 billion dollar Plan is, which is supposed to solve our problems with "economic stimulation" for the next 20 years!

So, will the Plan work? Or, Special interest politics, as usual?

So, will the Plan work, that is, "stimulate" the economy? Maybe, nobody knows for sure? There is some "spread the wealth around," which I had assumed was only a campaign throw away line, but maybe not. I am not inherently against welfare, but it needs to be targeted and well thought out, two things DC in general and Liberalism in particular are not famous for? Also, I, as the President, am an infrastructure kind of guy, though most conservatives and libertarians are not, but the President and I lost out on that one, and he has been sufficiently chastened by the Congress!

A good bit of the money in the Stimulus Plan, if not in fact most of it, goes to failing state budgets and to our dysfunctional and inefficient public healthcare system and to "education," all three of which already shallow staggering sums of money. And we are already paying so much in taxes and so many different taxes (state, local, and federal) that nobody can believe it or keep up with them all for all the various state, local, and national services! Will a national bail out of 100s of billions make the situation better or worse? Hard to say? But not too hard to say? It does sound a lot like special interest politics, as usual, does it not? They have not worked too well in the past? And little reason to think they will in the future?

Maybe the Plan will "stimulate" the economy, maybe it won’t, but it does not seem very creative in its formulation (to say the least), and someone may have to come into office in 2012 and try to clean up one more failed Administration? A Stimulus Plan that fails to "stimulate" does just that,  fails (to stimulate). A 7500 or 7800, or whatever, Dow by summer (or fall), and Obama gets an F? With no "stimulation," but an 8500 or 8800 Dow, means minor stimulation by summer, and a D? And a 9800 Dow by summer is a C? And, 11,000 or better, a B? And 12,000 or better, an A, indeed!? (Assuming no down-the-line inflation to offset any such gains.) Or, some other yardstick may be better? In any case, it would seem Obama has fallen victim to the far Left of his Party, but the situation is worse than that in my opinion!

The political leadership of both political Parties is seemingly incompetent and often corrupt, we now know from the multimillionaire Daschle hearings. The politicians live like royalty above the law, or make laws to benefit themselves only, with virtually zero watchdog press left in America. The two Parties are out of touch not only with the people but even reality itself, in my opinion, economic and otherwise. And the politicians do not have the will to do the right thing, and they do not have the wisdom to do it if the idea that they should might happen to cross their minds! Sad state of affairs in America today, both politically and economically? Tragically. And we tend to see over and over in each successive administration the failures of either a radical Libertarian or Liberal extremism? We simply must have a new vision for a just Republic! (But who can give us one! That must be a subject for another day!)

Bottom-line: It was not Obama’s Plan but the Democrat Congress’ Plan that they crammed down his throat, apparently or at least presumably, but for which he will be held accountable in the end as W Bush was with the failed Republican Congress of his first 6 years. And the Plan will either stimulate a little or a lot in the coming months, or maybe not at all, or maybe even make things a little worse or even a lot worse. Probably something of a draw in the end, but with increased debt for the nation? We will know soon enough...

In truth, the Democrat Stimulus Plan may not be as bad as the critics say, I sure hope not for the sake of the nation, but if it is, the next administration may be able to get us back on track or at least attempt to just as this administration is attempting to straighten out the last administration’s mess. Is this going to be yet another failed Presidency, as almost all have been since World War II, or at least since Eisenhower and the 1950s? Let’s hope and pray not, but our dear new President has pretty much shot his wad for the next 4 years, one way or another, as he himself concedes.

The truth is a bipartisan plan may have had some chance of working. Not to be too critical, but just on the surface, this one appears to have little chance to really "stimulate" commerce and industry, and so forth, as such. Greatly expanding the welfare state may not be the best idea? Most of the money appears to be going to prop up failed Liberal programs, and though this will probably not ruin America or the US economy, The Stimulus Plan may well prove to be not only the high water mark, but the proverbial swan song, of welfare Liberal capitalism, just as the credit crisis was pretty much of Libertarian capitalism? This may be the end of the Liberal Democrat Party as we have known it for the last 4 or 5 decades. The nation is clearly in a great moral and spiritual crisis and has been since the cultural revolution of the 1960s, and every President has been pretty much a victim of this, through no fault of his own, and that is why virtually every President since Eisenhower, except Reagan, has been something of a failure, though I personally have always liked Bush One, I must say.

In any case, Reagan was a rare visionary, and as the Apostle John in the Bible, not completely "here." Reagan was good-natured, optimistic, effective, inspiring, and seemingly oblivious to the nastiest of criticisms. The Stimulus Plan is probably going to be Obama’s 9-11, his Iraq War, etc. due to forces of historical circumstance far beyond his control. We should look on the bright side of this thing I think. God is sovereign in history, and in order to have a truly new direction for the country away from a failed Liberalism/ Libertarianism and in order to have another Reagan-type visionary, we need another Jimmy Carter, and we may indeed have one here? (On steroids?) But, to President Obama’s credit, he was the first President of color (as the expression goes), no small matter, and he did give it his best shot for "hope and change" given an uncompliant Liberal Congress? And, further, he did deliver us from Hillary, for which I think the nation will always owe him a debt of gratitude? Still, we may be seeing the end of political and economic Liberalism, not only in American history but world history?

In the end, I think The Stimulus Plan will be seen to be almost an inevitable product of economic and political Liberalism and apparently not even done in good faith, (but in stealth and so forth, and for special groups primarily, and not bipartisan, and on, and on), but, still, whether in good faith or not, economic and political Liberalism is itself almost an inevitable product or manifestation of spiritual Liberalism. And spiritual Liberalism is for its part the result of rejecting traditional notions of God and conservative morality. What’s new? So, it says itself, no less.

What this means is the political and economic dysfunctionality on Wall Street and in DC with failed laws and policies and regulations, etc., is ultimately due to the larger social problem of rejecting traditional notions of God and conservative morality. Again, what’s new here? Re-establishing traditional notions of God and conservative morality will not, in itself, of course solve all our problems, but we do not have a fighting chance without these two things of traditional notions of God and conservative morality say Cicero and C. S. Lewis, of course, as is well known, and pretty much Aristotle, and even more so Socrates.

So, here we are giving economic, political and spiritual Liberalism one last massive, unprecedented effort in all history! Will it work? Maybe. Is The Stimulus Plan a massive last gasp or a brilliant massive set of policies? As the President has said over and over, it will be after only a few months of things getting worse (and then we will know). In fact, maybe The Stimulus Plan will just get lucky! As Brother Adrian used to say, even a stopped clock is right two times a day!

What a wonderful time to be alive and to be able to participate in these historical moments of massive importance and transition whether politically, economically, spiritually, morally, culturally or whether in law or education or in the arts and entertainment! This is indeed an era to set mankind on a new direction! I think President Obama is right; we are involved with something here that people will be talking about for many, many years to come... the successes and/or failures of "The Stimulus Plan". Maybe we need a 100 day countdown? From February 13th, 2:00 AM? "A day which will live in infamy" for the Liberal Democrat Party?

There is, I think, a day coming when we can carry on a national dialogue, reasonably and rationally, even honestly (wouldn’t that be something), about the role and function of government, and its desirable size and scope, but that day is probably still some time off, but hopefully not too far off. And if, and when, The Stimulus Plan fails in the coming months, maybe that will be a catalyst to start such a discussion once again, and follow honorably in the footsteps of our forefathers from previous generations... We have dropped the ball, big time, over the last 40 or 50 years... And, as is well known, all that is needed for disaster to triumph is for good men and women to do nothing...