I hope we haven't devolved back into the “This is my view, and anyone who disagrees with it hates America” type of talk.

Obama supporters, be wary. Knee-jerk support of the President wasn't a good thing when Bush was in charge, and it isn't a good thing now that Obama is in charge.

Her rationale was that this needed to be in the bill because of concerns about rising healthcare costs for the states- because preventing births will save costs when women have fewer kids. I oppose that argument too, but the main point here is that it doesn't belong in this bill and even she didn't justify it on the basis of economic stimulus, but rather on cost savings. I've made the point before- all of that needs to be separate from the 'emergency' bill. This would be comparable to a scenario if the past GOP Congress had put all kinds of pet conservative causes into the Patriot Act (and then kept taking to the airwaves to make sure everyone felt a great sense of urgency that justified quick passage of the bill without full review.) You know very well that you wouldn't approve of that kind of process, so please stop acting as though that's not what's going on here. I get that you approve of all of the pet liberal causes that they're dumping in here, but just admit that's why you approve of it and not because you think it's going to provide a short term stimulus greater than the dollar amount that's being appropriated.

Money is fungible. If we give a woman X amount of dollars to spend on contraception, then not only will that X amount of dollars go to the healthcare industry, the X amount that she saved can go to things like food or car payments or something else that creates jobs.

It's not personal, Chris. I do object to the money going to Dem contributors like teachers unions and ACORN, but that's about as ideological as my opposition gets. That does to some extent go to motive- do Pelosi and Co. really think they're appropriating money to meet specific economic goals for the country or for their party?

But if you're thinking that my opposition is due to a personal feeling about what people 'deserve' (ie, unemployment benefits) then nothing could be farther from the truth. When I was growing up, my dad was unemployed for an extended time and my parent's did have to use benefits, and I currently have several friends who've lost jobs and have no prospects in sight. It's not a lack of empathy, but just a belief that we need clearheaded thinking about the best ways to spend public money as efficiently as possible.

Again, there's nothing wrong with some of those goals to reduce the burden of healthcare costs, but that doesn't create jobs or increase consumer spending in the short term which is what this is supposed to be about.

As far as getting money to the unemployed to stimulate the economy, the only problem with that argument is you have to compare it to what other potential uses of the money are available. If spending the money elsewhere creates a job for that person more quickly, then that would be a better course of action than giving him extended unemployment compensation. Plus, these things are always discusses as though there is no waste or 'soft fraud.' One of the provisions I believe is to provide unemployment insurance for part time workers who lose their jobs. Well, that sounds good if you're talking about someone who was working two jobs and loses the part time one, and then doesn't have enough income to sustain his/her family. But so many part timers are not in that situation- they're often kids, or people working just to earn some extra cash, etc. Are you going to tell me that such folks are going to refrain from collecting the unemployment benefits and defer to those who really need it? We just can't afford to spread this money (again, which we don't actually have, and which costs far, far more than the dollar amount shown when you add in the interest costs) around so much.

Come on though, it's impossible to say that healthcare spending or unemployment spending won't stimulate the economy. We have a gigantic healthcare industry that employs many people, and if we can help the sick and keep those people employed or create news jobs, that's great.

It's more or less the same thing with unemployed people. They need to spend money just like the rest of us, they just don't have it. Every dinner they buy, every ounce of gas they put in their car, every suit they buy for an interview stimulates the economy.

And much of the bill contained things that truly have nothing to do with job creation, but rather to provide relief for those who are without jobs. I don't have a problem with that either but call it what it is- relief and not stimulus.

There's also the timing issue. A lot of economists agree that stimulus spending is almost always too late to do any good- because there's a delay before the jobs can actually be offered, and by that time many more people have lost their jobs and then consumption spending goes down and more companies have to lay off people, etc. That's one reason conservatives tend to argue for tax cuts (esp if they can happen immediately in the case of individuals, to start reducing the withholding from your paycheck right away) or to businesses so that they can consider the reduction in tax burden when analyzing whether or not they can continue making payroll.

This house version, however, is festooned with every sort of spending program imaginable, and somewhere between half and 80% of it seems to have nothing to do with stimulus, job creation, etc.

Yes, I'm sure I read that half the money will be burned rather than spent.

Seriously, if the government spent $800 billion on bee research, that would create jobs, at least in bee research. So don't argue that this bill wont be a stimulus, you just think it's the wrong kind.

I seem to recall quite a bit of discussion about the amount of debt accrued under Bush and the GOP Congress, often specifically attacking the Iraq War spending. There have been lots of discussions about how much that was costing the future generations.

So, if you are a supporter of this bill who felt that way in the past, how does it strike you as OK to put forth expenditures in one fell swoop (within first 30 days of Congress, before ANY other budget issues are debated) that immediately authorizes as much spending as the entire Iraq War?

I realize the immediate response to that will be that this is necessary spending and that wasn't, and that this is going for humanitarian kind of spending rather than war. But still, considering the size of the expenditure and what that does to our debt, shouldn't you at least take the time to learn more about what's actually in the bill and whether or not it's even feasible for it to have the intended effect? I mean really, shouldn't we be a BIT more circumspect?

I don't see any evidence that the pro-Dem commenters here are using any objective standard to make that assessment, J, and instead are applying a blanket assumption of good intent and smart policy corrections. Given the polling numbers for the Dem led Congress, I'd say you guys are in the minority in giving that benefit of the doubt.

I've listed several reasons in various comment threads here why I believe this stimulus package is chock full of mistakes that we can ill afford. Maybe if you'd try giving some reasons that you disagree with me instead of asserting your articles of faith, we could actually debate the issues at hand?

From our point of view, I'd advise you to take a look around and be honest about how terribly ironic it is for you to now support the Democrats attempts to add a pile of new mistakes on top of the past majority party's mistakes.

This house version, however, is festooned with every sort of spending program imaginable, and somewhere between half and 80% of it seems to have nothing to do with stimulus, job creation, etc.

Jazz, care to support this claim?

I've done more than my fair share of criticizing the Republicans, but I don't blame them at all for not backing this abomination of a pork fueled fire sale. I wouldn't have voted for it either.