It's an individual (and familial) virtue, which in a deflationary spiral is seen as a collective vice (the paradox of thrift — what's good ends up being seen as bad).

Note that if we got radical and issued large enough checks, people would largely be promptly satisfied with debt service, saving, and investments, and be moved finally to spend. Not that I advocate such radicalism, but I'm moved to ask aloud, if only rhetorically — or perhaps truly — given how much we've spent on the bailout and what we plan to spend now (and then, more later) on stimulation efforts, why not just issue each citizen a check for the per capita share of the total amount? How many thousands to millions would that end up being eventually, given division of the entire amount by approximately 150 million heads?

If we do spend on things, I advocate longer-term things like infrastructure that may not satisfy the impatient or the worried (Tom Daschle is no longer an Obama man, so we don't have to worry about hearing him again say as a public official that he is “concerned”), and to name something in my home area (which raises my interest; I'm not saying it has first claim to anything or even that it would pass a selection process in Washington), here's an infrastructure project that would benefit Michigan and Ohio. This is an example of something that could begin right now.

http://www.aep.com/about/i765project/docs/AEP-ITC-Whit...

http://www.aep.com/about/transmission/Michigan7…

“Right now I do favor a stimulus check.”

If for nothing else, as a “remedial dividend” or “shareholder's refund” given back to us taxpayers from Washington as a penalty for poor performance…

Stimulus will not work. Period. They never do. Its all political manuevering to try and win support for your party.

The bill passed by the house was simply “Voodoo Economics.” Here's hoping the Senate gets it right.

1. Debt must be paid.
2. Business must recoup their capital in the form of payments for services rendered and goods provided.
3. The piper was hired. Now its time to pay him.

Stimulus is not going to work. The fact that we gave banks money and now everyones complaining that those banks arent lending is simple economics. No ones borrowing. Hello. Who wants to borrow money in the midst of one of the most powerful recessions in decades? No one. The money is not going to waste. Propping up the banks will continue to make our nations economic health strong for the long run but it still will do very little to stimulate the economy.

There are many things to do and most of them are shoring up the fundamentals of this economy while we pay the piper.

Recessions must run their course. People need time to earn wages, and pay back what they owe. As debt gets paid down the workers free up money and will cautiously begin testing the waters of spending.

I'd accept some kind of stimulus, for most want one, but one with Major Changes.

Yes, as Silhouette says — get rid of the junk, make this purely a stimulus package, though I say some longer-term payoff items that can grow the economy can go in there. In fact, the area where most people are likely to agree on content in any stimulus package is on the presence of infrastructure items and projects. Roads, bridges, power lines — we can use them. Everyone can likely identify new projects that would benefit their location; in addition to knowing of such projects in other places, here in Detroit I can name one new-construction project that makes perfect sense (somewhat under ten miles in length). (Rudi: Complete the depressed freeway and convert Hall Road to one-way frontage roads from Van Dyke to Interstate 94, the same way it is depressed freeway west of Van Dyke past Merrill and Mound. The center strip along Hall east of there is multiple lanes wide and each side of that strip has three to five lanes, some of which obviously could be sacrificed for freeway right of way.) It's not pork or a gimmick when and where it makes sense to do it. (The only question in Detroit's case is how much it is merited compared with other such projects, many of which already have been planned and simply need funding, elsewhere.)

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=e…

There are bigger, niftier projects we could do. Los Angeles could use two 30+ mile all-new freeways to fill gaps in its network. And the Bay Area is long overdue for the Southern Crossing. (I wish we could revisit the lousy Eastern Bay Bridge project and do one or two other things I know of that are far better architecturally, too.) How about a BART line running between SFO and OAK airports and connecting the end of BART in the Peninsula to the East Bay viaduct or making Bay Fair into a transfer station and having the trains proceed to Dublin? How about extending the BART lines, including BART on the Peninsula to complement Caltrain, or running BART into Marin County?

* * *

The other important issue here, which I seized immediately and I suspect others such as Mikkel will, too, is the pessimism of the public. That's a recipe for more recession and for deflation, especially if there are more sales than there currently (already) are and people learn to anticipate lower prices in the future. That, in addition to increasing pessimism simply from observing the economy not getting better rapidly.

Drop the stuff that won't directly and immediately support the economy. You have time. Quit thinking to the next election and actually govern now in the best interest of the American people. If it works, if it pays off, they're goint to re-elect you. If you fail by padding too many fluffy issues in, they're going to replace you. Assure the liberals that their pet-fluffy projects will thrive under your continued leadership down the line. Assure the neocons that after the new deal stabilizes the patient, they may continue to exploit it after a year or so.

Then everyone will be happy. But if you're myopic and stupid now and err on the side of pleasing everyone at the expense of narrowing the focus to that one shot that will bring us back…you won't have to worry about your or any other jobs. They'll all be gone.

Just do the job you were elected to do and forget about your wealth and status for just one millisecond Congress.