I'm going to give up on this thread and just keep things going over at Jazz's thread about Michelle Malkin.

One of things I'll be linking over there is a Gallup poll showing 52% of Americans supported passing the stimulus plan.

George, in another thread (I think Stickings' post about GOP hating America or whatever) I posted a link to public opinion polls. It's not overwhelming, but a majority don't like the bill as it stands, majority are more concerned about increasing spending than cutting taxes, etc, etc.

The contraception thing was the kind of issue that the media can't resist covering, and Obama wisely saw that they didn't need the headache of divisive culture war issues mixed in this so he told the Dem leadership to nix it. He didn't do so on other provisions that the GOP found objectionable, simple as that. There weren't the kind of hot button topics that the GOP could get out to the public, but in spite of that the public still agrees more with their side than with Pelosis- but she's gonna do it her way.

And once again, OK, fine- but she'll reap what she sows.

I am not claiming they were asked to be a part of anything by the House leadership.

What I am claiming is that they managed to get some stuff they didn't like out of the bill, by whatever means. I'm no expert on how the process of passing a bill works. And while certainly the majority gets to have its way, undoubtedly there's plenty of activity that goes on behind the scenes.

I presume those means would be available for more important items.

And let me turn your question around on you: If contraception funding was removed because it got out to the public, maybe the public approves of the rest of the bill.

Now, of course, I don't think that's the case. But I also don't think the contraception funding deleted itself. I imagine there was some process involved.

It seems to me that the House Republicans gave up on the process so they could make a statement. If you want to say that statement was one of fiscal responsibility, okay.

To me, it's a statement that Republicans prefer playing politics to the difficult work of finding solutions.

OK, I think I've got it now.

Again, I suggest: maybe there would have been more cut out, or other improvements, if the House Republicans had willing to take part in negotiations.

After all, they somehow got the contraception money out, didn't they?

The money for renovating the naional mall was $200 million, not just $2 million.

Surely, $200 million counts as a lot of money.

Isn't it likely that only a few minor items were dropped because Republicans made the political decsion not to support the stimulus bill.

They can't have input if they opt out of the process.

I appreciate your willingness to acknowledge they were engaging to some degree of triangulation. But are they just going to prefer triangulation to engagement? The economic seems too important for them to just play politics.

As a conservative, don't you feel they should be engaged in the process in order to represent your interests?

The latter makes sense- that they'd be left in even though the plan is to take them out- because it leaves bargaining chips so that they can appear to be more conciliatory during the next step of the process without having to give up any more.

Even still- those are two pretty minor components compared to all the rest of the spending which is either long term in nature or geared toward increasing the social contract instead of providing stimulus.

The House GOP handled this perfectly- they were respectful of Obama's gestures but explained that Pelosi's heavy handedness prevented them from having any input

Is this actually correct? Weren't some things dropped from the bill at Republican insistance?

Paul, who is also a member of the House Financial Services Committee, warned that such measures will cause a recession to turn into a full scale depression possibly worse than that of the 1930s.

During a Television interview with CNN, Paul explained why he believes stimulus funding is such a destructive policy.

“It’s because the government is spending it. If the people were spending it it would be fine, but the government never does anything productive. They have to take money from productive individuals and spend it in non productive ways, so it’s just digging a bigger hole, getting us into bigger debt, and that is the problem.” Paul said.

“This stimulus package is going to cost each and every American $6700 of more debt, so how can that be beneficial? If debt was the answer we would of never had a problem.”

“We are doing exactly what we did in the 1930s, we are taking a recession and working very hard to try and turn it into a depression.” The Congressman added.
“What we’re worried about right now, well certainly I am, is that it’s worse than the 30’s because we’re on the verge of destroying the dollar. So if you think the financial crisis is bad, and the financial system isn’t working, wait ’til you find out when the Dollar doesn’t work.”

The Congressman told viewers that only by liquidating debt, allowing the market to operate freely and allowing prices to come down will the problem be corrected.
Paul also spoke to those who have blamed the free market for the downturn and have suggested that deregulation is a primary cause of the financial crisis.
“We never had a hands off approach, that’s the fallacy, and as long as we believe that we will never correct our problem. If you blame Capitalism and free markets and sound money for this then we can’t win the intellectual fight.” Paul urged.
“If you want to regulate, regulate Government agencies, regulate the Treasury, regulate the Federal Reserve. The Federal Reserve has no oversight, they’re not even permitted to be audited by law, so that’s the kind of oversight we need. The Federal Reserve has committed trillions of dollars to individuals, corporations and banks, they don’t even have to tell us where it’s gone to.” he added.