Is anyone listening to President Obama anymore? (How about President Obama?)

"What we can’t do -- what I won’t do -- is let this economic crisis be used as an excuse to wipe out the basic protections that Americans have counted on for decades. I reject the idea that we need to ask people to choose between their jobs and their safety. I reject the argument that says for the economy to grow, we have to roll back protections that ban hidden fees by credit card companies, or rules that keep our kids from being exposed to mercury, or laws that prevent the health insurance industry from shortchanging patients. I reject the idea that we have to strip away collective bargaining rights to compete in a global economy. We shouldn’t be in a race to the bottom, where we try to offer the cheapest labor and the worst pollution standards. America should be in a race to the top. And I believe that’s a race we can win."

-- President Obama, in his speech last night

"Words, words, words, I'm so sick of words."

-- Liza Dolittle, in My Fair Lady

by Ken

This is what I'm wondering: Is anybody actually listening to the president anymore? I mean, besides his hardy band of die-hard loyalists and his even hardier band of die-hard oppo researchers.

And I'm definitely wondering whether the president listens to himself. "What we can’t do -- what I won’t do -- is let this economic crisis be used as an excuse to wipe out the basic protections that Americans have counted on for decades." I guess, if you want to be technical, his own all-too-fresh weaselly betrayal on smog standards doesn't qualify as wiping out a "protection that Americans have counted on for decades." But then, this administration hasn't exactly been at the forefront of enforcing the system of necessary regulation that, while inadequate to the growing environmental disasters we face, nevertheless brought about major improvements in the American quality of life in such areas as auto safety and improved air and water and food and drug safety and so many other areas in which sensible people sensibly expect government to take the lead and responsibility.

(As I've said before, the right gets away with pooh-poohing all of this because no one alive appears to remember what the country was like before we without all these steps. Sensible people understand that we need to be redoubling our efforts, not listening to fables about the awfulness of government regulation etc. The regulatory model for the Obama administration, as with so many areas of policy, seems to be closely modeled on that of the Bush regime.)

Now, at to what was actually in the speech, well, last Friday I wrote:

Was I the only one who involuntarily cringed when the announcement was first made that the president would be addressing Congress to announce his "jobs plan"? I mean, don't we all assume that whatever the "plan" includes, it's going to be yet another of those deals where we have to figure out whether the tiny bit of possible good buried among the dross is enough to offset the rest, where the right-wing America-haters get more than they could have dreamed of before negotiations even begin>

And I don't find anything in the "plan" to change my mind. Here's Ian Welsh's take:

The plan is supposedly 447 billion. By my count about 253 billion of that is in tax cuts. Corporations are sitting on a ton of money, tax cuts will not make them hire. Minor tax cuts for households will be used primarily for debt de-leveraging unless there is a general recovery with wage increases, since people will not spend in a depressionary environment. Most of the spending is on projects which are run by states, and the money is fungible and will be effectively diverted to avoid tax increases.

There are no structural fixes for what is wrong with the economy here. There is nothing to deal with the fact that even if it did work (it won’t) it would cause a run up in commodity prices, especially oil, which would crush the recovery anyway. There is nothing to deal with the fact that most US banks are still bankrupt, except some incentives for Americans to buy houses so securitization can continue. There is nothing to stop employers from calculation the tax rebates as effective raises, and thus not offering raises themselves (which is what they will do.) There is nothing to make any corporation which already doesn’t pay taxes (more than you want to think about) to pay those taxes.

This stimulus is more than half tax cuts, which is worse than the first stimulus. It is not as large as the first stimulus. It will probably save or create a few jobs, but it will not kick the country out of depression.

All of this even assuming you’re stupid enough to believe this will pass as envisioned. It won’t. Obama is a weak president, and the Republicans will not pass most of the useful parts of this bill, though no doubt they’ll be happy to pass the tax cuts.

Oh, and Obama wants the entire thing offset by deficit reduction. Given how weak a stimulus this is to begin with, I predict that if passed with offsets it WILL DO MORE DAMAGE TO THE ECONOMY THAN GOOD.

I see various progressives who think talk matters are cheering the wording of Obama’s speech. He sure does talk purdy, doesn’t he? Reminds me of his promises during the election campaign, in fact.

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