Bipartisan Support for an Investment-Based Stimulus Does Exist, Just Not in Congress
| Mon Jan. 26, 2009 10:24 AM PST
Obama is working overtime to get Republicans on the Hill behind his stimulus package, which is driving him to excessive tax cuts and other questionable decisions. But if bipartisan support is his goal, he's already got it. The American voting populace, including Democrats, Republicans, and independents, is behind a progressive stimulus package that sees infrastructure investment, not tax cuts, as the primary vehicle for restarting the American economy. Here's top dog Republican pollster Frank Luntz, via David Sirota:
Last month, I conducted a national survey of 800 registered voters on their attitudes toward infrastructure investment...The survey's findings were unlike any other issue I have polled in more than a decade...A near unanimous 94% of Americans are concerned about our nation's infrastructure. And this concern cuts across all regions of the country and across urban, suburban and rural communities. Fully 84% of the public wants more money spent by the federal government -- and 83% wants more spent by state governments -- to improve America's infrastructure. And here's the kicker: 81% of Americans are personally prepared to pay 1% more in taxes for the cause.
This isn't "soft" support for infrastructure either. It stretches from Maine to Montana, from California to Connecticut. Democrats (87%) and Republicans (74%) are prepared to, in Barack Obama's words, put skin in the game, which tells you just how wide and deep the support is...
I hope Obama takes heed of this. Instead of bending to the will of an obstructionist minority, he should show that minority that the American people are on-board with a progressive stimulus, and it can do the same or risk getting left behind.
And speaking of getting on-board, can we get some mass transit in this sucker?
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Comments
Ok, we are NOT a democracy at the national level; we are a constitutional republic. It really doesn't matter what the populace thinks about an issue. What matters is what the elected representatives think which translates into how they vote on a bill.
Just remember one thing: not too long ago, the polls were saying that 66% of the American people were pretty much sick of the war in Iraq. During an interview with Vice President Cheney, Martha Raddatz of ABC brought up this poll. Cheney's response: So? Here's the link:
http://www.abcnews.go.com/GMA/Vote2008/story?id=4479462&page=1
Jonathan, the fact is that once again we have a government in the same condition that Solon warned Athenians about in 594 B.C. "Where there is law --- Those who do wrong, shackle it by doing so."
Fast forward to the 21st century today when no one in Washington seems to have learned anything about the history of Democracy because our government has failed us by allowing far too many to do wrong as a consequence of "petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics."
By coincidence a consequence of a failed Democracy made the news again yesterday when it was reported that hundreds of self-styled anarchists fought police in central Athens following a march to demand the release of people arrested during last month's riots. Indeed, we have been warned too many times that Democracy is a most fragile concept that has failed all too often since the world's first Democracy in Athens.
So today in America we have both failed government and failed Rule of Law that have created social crisis brought on by spiraling debt of the poor and middle classes once again produced by the greed of our own ruling elite just like in Athens and in far too many failed Democracies since 594 B.C.
History makes it more than obvious that we must restore cultural values as President Obama stated of "hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism" before we can restore a state of progress, but it remains to be seen whether Washington really cares about We The People once again as post inauguration political rhetoric returns to business as usual as you and many others have reported already within less than a week since Inauguration Day.
My question is, will President Obama be able to restore American Democracy to protect We The People as Solon, Cleisthenes and Pericles tried to accomplish with their first Democracy, and as Washington, Jefferson and Franklin attempted again in 1788? At this point I have grave doubts because they still marginalize President Eisenhower's grave warnings made in his Farewell Address to the Nation in 1961.
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