America, Your Stimulus Package

I'm sorry, American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan.

In the next two weeks, the House will consider the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan, which makes long-term investments that are worthy, needed, fully-screened, and based on merit, not politics. Developed with priorities shared by President-elect Obama, the plan will create or save 3 to 4 million American jobs, with an estimated 90 percent of the jobs created in the private sector—getting the American economy moving in the short term and making investments for a stronger economy in the long term. The Chairman’s mark (draft legislation) will be circulated and posted online later today and next week the Ways and Means Committee, Energy and Commerce Committee, and Appropriations Committee will mark-up the legislation.

The bill is actually up here, and if you don't speak Congress, a more readable report is here. The big takeaway is that we're up to an $825 billion dollar package, with 2/3 for investment and 1/3 for tax cuts. That's less than before, and the taxes are more focused on energy and middle-class tax relief than broad corporate cuts, but my sense is that's still a bit out of balance.

There are quite a bit of safeguards in the plan. It mandates no pet projects or earmarks (for now), with full transparency. In addition to Inspector General reviews, monthly reporting, whistleblower protections and competitive bidding, there will be a government website showing where all the stimulus money is headed, and the public will be able to oversee the spending. In addition, all the contracts will be going online, leading to this funny exchange:

ORSZAG: We plan to create a Web site that will contain information about the contracts and include PDFs or contracts themselves, and also financial information about the contracts.

LIEBERMAN: Define PDFs.

Sigh.

Chris Bowers has a very good rundown of where the spending is headed, and so does the aforementioned report from the Appropriations Committee. Practically every sector is going to be seeing a portion of this money, with major expenditures for health care, education, energy and the environment. There is unemployment relief and food stamp increases in the bill, which is good. There is a section called the "State Fiscal Stabilization Fund" that earmarks $79 billion to help the states. That too is good. But overall, this looks more like an omnibus appropriations bill than a targeted spending effort. That's not necessarily bad. But it has people like David Sirota upset.

The Post says the package "includes about $85 billion worth of infrastructure spending, most for highway and bridge construction." That's it - $85 billion in an $850 billion bill.

$85 billion for infrastructure in a nation that now regularly sees bridge collapses, steam pipe explosions, sink holes, dam failures, levee breaks and blackouts.

$85 billion at a time when Obama is demanding another $350 billion blank check for Wall Street.

$85 billion when the American Society of Civil Engineers says we need $1.6 trillion.

$85 billion in the same package that could include hundreds of billions of dollars in corporate tax cuts - many for the banks that created the economic mess. This, at a time when U.S. News & World Report notes that a new poll shows 81 percent of Americans are ready to pay higher taxes to fund significant infrastructure investments.

As Matt Yglesias notes, there is an error in thinking that the stimulus bill alone can solve our infrastructure problem - it can't, and we need to be thinking long-term about how we fund infrastructure (reforming the highway bill to get more money for transit and rail would be a good start). Also, flood control, a key infrastructure need, is included in the energy and environment spending, so there's some overlap here.

In general, this is decent but could be better, and given the drift already in the direction of more spending and less taxes, I would hope for that to continue. However, it's worth noting that everyone and his mother is going to be looking for a piece of the action here, and so "stimulus" could start to look a lot like "bailout" as it grows. Diligence is required.

Will David Obey de-fund the war?

David Obey, the chair of the House Appropriations Committee and therefore arguably the most important figure in terms of supplemental funding, just held a very interesting press conference, in which the key quote was this:

“As Chairman of the Appropriations Committee I have absolutely no intention of reporting out of Committee anytime in this session of Congress any such request that simply serves to continue the status quo."

The truth of this is a little more complicated. But the baseline of what Obey's saying is, at least for now, he won't let a blank check out of committee. If the White House will not submit any alternative, that's de-funding the war.

Let's look at the full context of Obey's remarks:

“I would be more than willing to report out a supplemental meeting the President’s request if that request were made in support of a change in policy that would do three things.

-- "Establish as a goal the end of U.S. involvement in combat operations by January of 2009."

-- "Ensure that troops would have adequate time at home between deployments as outlined in the Murtha and Webb amendments."

-- "Demonstrate a determination to engage in an intensive, broad scale diplomatic offensive involving other countries in the region."

“But this policy does not do that. It simply borrows almost $200 billion to give to the Departments of State, Defense, Energy, and Justice with no change in sight.

"Establish as a goal" is pretty weak tea, as we all know. It's of a piece with the Abecrombie-Tanner amendment being debated today, which does nothing but ask for a report on withdrawal rather than its implementation. And the Webb Amendment, while vital, is more of a slow-bleed than anything that will lead to a rapid drawdown.

But here's the thing. The White House won't accept this, and they believe this is a fight they can win. Of course they do, they've won it in the past. They just won it in the Senate:

Thwarted in efforts to bring troops home from Iraq, Senate Democrats on Monday helped pass a defense policy bill authorizing another $150 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The vote was 92-3.

The Senate bill doesn't guarantee that the money be spent; only a separate appropriations bill will manage that. And so what we're looking at is an impasse in the House Appropriations Committee. Will Obey shut it down, or will he just roll over? Well, maybe he can be flooded with the results of that new poll showing that Americans want to see the funding cut.

Most Americans oppose fully funding President George W. Bush's $190 billion request to fight the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan while a majority supports expanding a children's health care program he has threatened to veto, a Washington Post-ABC News poll shows.

The poll published on Tuesday also shows deep dissatisfaction with the president and with Congress, partly because of the stalemate between Democrats and the White House over Iraq policy, The Washington Post reported.

Only about 25 percent of Americans support the administration's $190 billion war funding request; 70 percent want the proposed allocation reduced, the Post said.

We aren't likely to see the allocation reduced, but surely the Democrats can manage to remove their heads from their posteriors enough to understand that the public wants bold action and doesn't mind a combative stance. Obey's statement is the first step toward that. If he's willing to use his power of the gavel to force actual policy changes, that's a real change.

There's also this bit of controversy:

“If the President really is concerned about stopping red ink, we are prepared to introduce legislation which will provide for a war surtax for that portion of military costs that are related to our military actions in Iraq.

“We are choosing not to offset costs associated with our efforts in Afghanistan, because we believe that those are legitimate, because our Afghanistan effort is aimed at eliminating the Taliban who gave shelter to al Qaeda, and that action will benefit future generations. But those future generations should not be saddled with paying for an ill advised war in Iraq that seems to be never ending.

“If this war is important enough to fight, then it ought to be important enough to pay for.

“We know that this proposal is going to be controversial – I don’t expect to get the support of our leadership or the support of our caucus at this point – but by putting together this bill we hope people will stop ignoring what this war is costing American taxpayers and call the President’s bluff on fiscal responsibility.

I highlighted the part where Obey doesn't expect the support of the leadership on the war tax. The truth is that he doesn't need it. He holds the gavel on Appropriations, and nothing will pass without his say so.

I'm not convinced that Obey has the wherewithal to really cut the funding. But he's certainly moving in that direction.

Second Verse, Same As The First

You may remember that John Doolittle stepped down from his seat on the House Appropriations Committee because of the ongoing scandal into his ties with convicted felon Jack Abramoff.

The GOP leadership, sensing that there's an almost unlimited well of corrupt California Republicans who can replace Doolittle, decided to call up one from the minors.

Yesterday, the House Republican Steering Committee voted to seat Rep. Ken Calvert (R-CA) on the Appropriations Committee, “filling the vacancy left by embattled Rep. John Doolittle (R-CA),” who is under investigation by the FBI for his longstanding ties to convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

Named one of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington’s “20 Most Corrupt Members of Congress,” Calvert has a history of abusing his power just as much as Doolittle.

This is part of the Law of Conservation of Conservative Californians - corrupt GOP Congressmen from this state can neither be created or destroyed, always remaining in equilibrium. Until we retire them.

Made huge personal profits off his own earmark. Calvert pushed through an earmark to secure over $9 million for freeway and commercial development near property he owned in California. After the development of the area, Calvert sold his property for a 79 percent profit.

Personal firm received commission from earmark. “In another deal, a group of investors bought property a few blocks from the site of a proposed interchange, for $975,000. Within six months, after the earmark for the interchange was appropriated, the parcel of land sold for $1.45 million. Rep. Calvert’s firm received a commission on the sale.”

Rewarded K Street firm under investigation with pork projects. The Copeland Lowery lobbying firm is currently “enmeshed in a federal investigation of Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-CA).” “Rep. Calvert has helped pass through at least 13 earmarks sought by Copeland Lowery in 2005, adding up to over $91 million.” The lobbying firm has been Calvert’s largest campaign contributor.

Traveled to Saudi Arabia with convicted Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (R-CA) in 2004. They were accompanied by Thomas Kontogiannis, an alleged co-conspirator in the Cunningham controversy.

And Calvert is rewarded for this sterling record by getting his hands closer to the earmark cookie jar, on Appropriations. I'm guessing he won't be able to help himself.