Obama's Recovery Act's Energy Program saved $5.2 billion, and created 62,902 jobs.

If American wants to lead, why not in clean energy, it's a no brainer. And yet, the facts below won't mean anything to anti-environment, anti-government, anti-American, anti-job creating freeloaders who are happy with fossil fuels. Republicans are still saying the Recovery Act was a failure:

This document presents findings from an evaluation of the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant (EECBG) Program ...

 from 2009 to 2015. It was funded by the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA or Recovery Act) and was a one-time program.

Labor impacts ... EECBG produced a net total job gain of 62,902 job years for the BPAs studied. 

EECBG saved $1.7 billion in social costs of carbon due to energy savings alone and an additional $62 million in social costs avoided from displaced energy as a result of renewable generation. 

Bill Savings and cost-effectiveness ... produced $5.2 billion of total cumulative savings on energy bills, 70% of which were realized by residential consumers, 29% in the public institutional sector, and 1% the commercial and industrial sectors. 

Here are some graphs:

Dumb Ron Johnson describes Scott Walker…sorry, I meant Russ Feingold as a “career politician.” “He’s addicted to it,” and “simply run(s) for office to be somebody with a big title. We don’t need that.”

This isn't the first time Dumb Ron Johnson has bashed someone as a career politician, never grasping the idea that he could very well be describing Scott Walker. Seriously, see for yourself:

Johnson said it wasn't surprising Feingold had gotten into the race 18 months before the

election.

"Russ Feingold is a career politician. He's addicted to it. He just can't stand being away from it, and so he's just got to announce."

"Russ Feingold ...what did he do? He built government. He built it larger and more intrusive. What we do not need are career politicians that simply run for office to be somebody with a big title. We don't need that."

Thank you Ron, we'll all keep that in mind about Scott Walker. Oddly, the description fails to come close to Feingold's time as senator, and away from office as a professor at Stanford University in California.

Dumb Ron Johnson unknowingly criticized Rep. Paul Ryan back in February, bashing Feingold's welcome support of the stimulus package. Ryan didn't just vote for a stimulus once, he spent taxpayer money like a drunken sailor:  

(Ryan) had voted for the Bush stimulus, along with the Bush tax cuts, the Bush wars, the Bush security spending binge, the Bush prescription drug benefit, the Bush highway bill that included the Bridge to Nowhere, and the Bush bank bailout. Fiscal conservatism!

So Johnson's shot at Feingold sounds hollow, dumb even. And Johnson is back to his old tricks of passing absolute nonsense along as fact. That's why I gave him his name:

“With Russ Feingold plotting his return to power, it’s worth remembering that when he voted for the failed $830 billion stimulus...”

Forward Progress corrected Johnson's recollection of the past:

Amazing isn't it? Here we are, coming off the best economic year this country has experienced since the Clinton presidency, and Republicans continue to try to claim that the 2009 stimulus package was a failure. Not to mention that the stimulus didn't just help create jobs, it also aided in saving millions of jobs that might have been lost.

Speaking of nonsense, WISGOP has reared its ugly head with coordinated support for Johnson:

6 Degrees of Truth Ending 6 GOP Lies.

In a Rolling Stone article titled “Six Studies That Show Everything Republicans Believe is Wrong: It's time for the right wing to stop lying about the minimum wage, taxes, global warming and more,” we’re finally getting around to telling right wingers what we should have been saying all along-the truth. But instead, the media decided some time ago to treat the truth and BS the same, out of respect to the clueless and to appear neutral to the point of silliness.

My simple truth is: If you treat snake oil salesmen like doctors, you get a lot of snake oil doctors:

1. The Minimum Wage Doesn't Kill Jobs: In the early Nineties, David Card and Alan Krueger found "no evidence that the rise in New Jersey's minimum wage reduced employment at fast-food restaurants in the state." The most comprehensive meta-study of the minimum wage examined 64 studies and found "little or no evidence" that a higher minimum wage reduces employment.

2. The Stimulus Created Millions of Jobs: The Republican belief that markets are always good and government is always bad led them to argue that diverting resources to the public sector this way would have disastrous results. They were wrong: The stimulus worked, with the most reliable studies finding that it created millions of jobs. 

3. Taxing The Rich Doesn't Hurt Economic Growth: Republicans believe that the wealthy are the vehicles of economic growth … investment is driven by demand, not supply; if there are viable investments to be made, they will be made regardless of tax rates … Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez, two of the eminent economists of inequality, find no correlation between marginal tax rates and economic growth. Inequality reduces the incomes of the middle class, and therefore demand, which in turn stunts growth. 

4. Global Warming is caused by Humans: James Powell finds that over a one year period, 2,258 articles on global warming were published by 9,136 authors. Of those, only one, from the Herald of the Russian Academy of Sciences, rejected man-made global warming. That one article was likely motivated by the Russian government's interest in exploiting arctic shale. Another, even more comprehensive study, examining 11,944 studies over a 10-year period, finds that 97 percent of scientists accepted the scientific consensus that man-made global warming is occurring.

5. The Affordable Care Act is Working: President Obama's centrist healthcare bill was informed by federalism (delegating power to the states) … Republicans, undeterred, decried it as Soviet-style communism based on "death panels" – never mind the fact that the old system, which rationed care based on income, is the one that left tens of thousands of uninsured people to die. From the beginning, Republicans have predicted disastrous consequences or Obamacare, none of which came true. It's worth noting that every time the CBO estimates how much Obamacare will cost, the number gets lower. Odd how we've never heard Republicans say that.

6. Rich people are no better than the rest of us: Politicians on the right like to pretend that having money is a sign of hard work and morality – and that not having money is a sign of laziness. This story is contradicted by human experience and many religious traditions … But it's also contradicted by the facts – more and more rich people are getting their money through inheritances, and science shows that they are no more benevolent than others.

Walker takes credit for Doyle Job Creation and doesn't mention Obama Stimulus Funding.

Forbes Magazines Rick Unger couldn't help chiming in on "Plagiarismado" blowing through Wisconsin. Whatever you call the following, Scott Walker got caught being the big hypocrite that he's always been for the last 3 and half years as governor. A while back he took credit for jobs created under former Gov. Jim Doyle.

Just amazing really. It would be a big story if it weren't for the fact that he's another Teflon Republican:

Plagiarism is defined as the “wrongful appropriation,” “close imitation,” or “purloining and publication” of another author’s ”language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions,” and the representation of them as one’s own original work.

With that in mind, welcome to this week’s episode in the stirring adventures of Scott Walker – the ‘truth challenged’ Governor of Wisconsin.

Today’s chapter involves the Curt Manufacturing Company, a large manufacturer of trailer hitches located near Eau Claire, Wisconsin where the Governor traveled last week – with news cameras and writers in tow – to make a big fuss about providing the funding that will create 125 new jobs at the company. In a news release, Walker said –

"This project directly creates 125 new jobs and indirectly creates 129 jobs, resulting in $12.6million in annual wages right here in Wisconsin. By providing these funds, we are bringing quality jobs to Wisconsin while improving road access to Curt Manufacturing’s expanded facility." Via Wisconsin Journal Sentinel

Way to go Governor! And by ‘Governor’, I am, of course, referring to Governor Jim Doyle, Walker’s Democratic predecessor who is the one actually responsible for arranging the funding that created the 125 jobs.

In a December, 2010 press release (prior to Walker taking office) the Wisconsin Department of Commerce in the Doyle Administration announced that they were awarding Curt Manufacturing the $400,000 in tax credits and $11 million in tax-free bonds that would create the 125 new jobs.

It gets better. Where do you imagine this funding came from? A transportation grant created in the dreaded Obama stimulus program-the very legislation Governor Walker never misses an opportunity to trash.

Here comes the bigger lie:

So confusing was the dog and pony show Walker created to take credit for someone else’s work, the media actually found themselves confused. Commerce Secretary Paul Jardin stepped into the breach (and said), “Generally, the press releases or press conferences are tied around when the company wants to do something. Obviously, they want to do it with a governor present. That’s probably what occurred here.”

Yes, that is probably what happened here. Or not – or at least not according to the president of Curt Manufacturing, Curt Tamborino. “Walker’s office had called and said they wanted to do this final presentation with a press release in front of the media.”

So, is it plagiarism when a governor takes direct credit for the work done by a previous administration – or just plain, old-fashion lying? I suppose it doesn’t matter.  A lie is a lie is a lie. What does matter is that Walker, and his clearly hapless administration, can’t seem to work out how to pull off a political lie without constantly getting caught red-handed. 

Obama's Stimulus a Big Success, but not in Fox News World.

The Fox News host asked viewers if they thought the Obama stimulus was a success or not, suggesting it wasn't, similar to the claims they've been made over and over for years.

Completely muddying up the facts and actual report, Ed Henry couldn't have been more convoluted, deferring instead to Wall Street Journal hack Stephen Moore's ridiculous comment:

Moore: "It was maybe the most expensive policy mistake ever made in Washington."

So Gretchen Carlson said this:

"So what is the White House's case then for the stimulus, how are they saying that it worked so well?"

Gotcha? You almost have to laugh. But here's the incredibly good news Carlson and Henry failed dot mention:

New estimates from the Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) find that the President’s Jobs Legislation Had a Substantial and Sustained Impact on the Economy. This translates to an average of 1.6 million jobs a year for four years through the end of 2012 … elevate the productivity and output of the American economy long after the Act has fully phased out.

o Initiated more than 15,000 transportation projects, which will improve nearly 42,000 miles of road, mend or replace over 2,700 bridges, and provide funds for over 12,220 transit vehicles.

o Made the largest-ever investments in American high-speed rail, constructing or improving approximately 6,000 miles of high-performance passenger rail corridors and procurement of 120 next-generation rail cars or locomotives.

o Cleaned up 1,566 acres of properties that are now ready for reuse, far exceeding the original target of 500 acres, and led to 30,900 old diesel engines being retrofitted, replaced, or retired, which has reduced lifetime emissions of carbon dioxide by 840,300 tons and particulate matter by 3,900 tons.

o Improved more than 3,000 water quality infrastructure projects and Clean Water projects, serving more than 78 million people nationwide, as well as bringing 693 drinking water systems (serving over 48 million Americans) into compliance with Safe Drinking Water Act standards.

o Launched the innovative Race to the Top Program. Encouraged by the incentives in Race to the Top, 34 states modified state education laws and policies in ways known to help close the achievement gap and improve student outcomes.

o Provided the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) to begin researching transformative energy technologies such as second-generation biofuels, more efficient batteries, superconducting wires, and vehicles powered by natural gas.

o Boosted federal funding to renewable wind, solar, and geothermal energy as well as leveraging private dollars to help increase wind electricity net generation nationwide by 145 percent, and solar thermal and photovoltaic electricity net generation by more than fourfold from 2008 to 2012.

Just what did the Stimulus do?

The New York Times wrote this nice piece Sunday about the Obama stimulus, which surprisingly, doesn't look anything like Republican version. I'm posting this part of the article because it's short:

The reputation of the stimulus is meticulously restored from shabby to skillful in Michael Grunwald’s important new book, “The New New Deal.” On the most basic level, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is responsible for saving and creating 2.5 million jobs. The majority of economists agree that it helped the economy grow by as much as 3.8 percent, and kept the unemployment rate from reaching 12 percent.

The stimulus is the reason, in fact, that most Americans are better off than they were four years ago ... But the stimulus did far more than stimulate: it protected the most vulnerable from the recession’s heavy winds. Of the act’s $840 billion final cost, $1.5 billion went to rent subsidies and emergency housing that kept 1.2 million people under roofs. (That’s why the recession didn’t produce rampant homelessness.) It increased spending on food stamps, unemployment benefits and Medicaid, keeping at least seven million Americans from falling below the poverty line.

And as Mr. Grunwald shows, it made crucial investments in neglected economic sectors that are likely to pay off for decades. It jump-started the switch to electronic medical records, which will largely end the use of paper records by 2015. It poured more than $1 billion into comparative-effectiveness research on pharmaceuticals. It extended broadband Internet to thousands of rural communities. And it spent $90 billion on a huge variety of wind, solar and other clean energy projects that revived the industry. Republicans, of course, only want to talk about Solyndra, but most of the green investments have been quite successful, and renewable power output has doubled.

Americans don’t know most of this, and not just because Mitt Romney and his party denigrate the law as a boondoggle every five minutes. Democrats, so battered by the transformation of “stimulus” into a synonym for waste and fraud (of which there was little), have stopped using the word. Only four speakers at the Democratic convention even mentioned the recovery act, none using the word stimulus.

Before Obama, Ryan backed big government Stimulus help.

Rachel Maddow reviews how Republicans, who once supported huge stimulus packages, are claiming now they don't work. Hell, they even took credit for their own state's federal assistance from Obama's "failed" plan. But Ezra Klein details how the stimulus not only worked, but explains how in the past, Republican fiscal hawks wanted more money than Obama asked for.

The trick here is that most Americans will never know how they're being scammed by Ryan and the Republican Tea Party revolutionaries. When you're all over the place, who can keep track?

Ryan begged for Stimulus, Unemployment, and Health Care Assistance in 2002 Recession. Hypocrisy Exposed...Again!!!

This could be the game changer. The very policies Paul Ryan blames for turning the U.S. safety nets into hammocks, and ending our entrepreneurial freedoms, are the same policies that filled a need in his own agenda back in 2002. Heads up to the Huffington Post for the tip.

MSNBC's Chris Hayes uncovered lost video of Ryan on the House floor pleading his case for the same kind of stimulus Obama has been pushing since taking the presidency. How will the tea party react to this? They want to win, so they'll drop kick their whole agenda for Paul "two face" Ryan. Here's Hayes' analysis:



Just for fun, and to get the word out for those who want to use this video, here are the individual Ryan clips. First, Ryan insisted on July 1, 2010, the whole idea of a stimulus is a false premise.



Back in 2002, Ryan supported creating jobs by supporting unemployment and Medicaid health coverage;



Finally, Ryan admits in an economic slumps, the revenues aren't there to revamp Social Security and Medicare...recovery is first:

Ryan meets another protesters, and the Romney/Ryan list of Lies.

Paul Ryan continues to be reminded not everyone believes everything he's saying about the stimulus. Love the protesters guts and showmanship when he tore up a Romney/Ryan sign.

I also love the mob like audience falling all over themselves, buying this GOP snake oil, shouting down one guy in the crowd. Stoning's next?



Here's the longer video where Ed Schultz tracks all the Romney/Ryan lies. It's important to note that no matter how good a point Ed or anyone in the more liberal media makes, we're locked in our own echo chamber. We're fooling ourselves if we think were changing anyone's mind with the facts. The polls are showing that.

Janesville's favorite son is polling well in the state, putting Romney in the lead by 1 percentage point. Likability is up for Ryan too. I'm fascinated by the fact that Ryan has the ability to actually sell a horribly unrealistic 30 year plan on the deficit, require greater out of pocket costs to seniors on a fixed income for Medicare, reduce or get rid of hard working Americans safety nets, penalize the public for an economy trashed by Wall Street banks, and turn health care into a consumer product you either can or can't afford.

Romney/Ryan are slightly behind, tie and ahead according to recent polls. It's close, leaning toward a Republican win, and a big win for the Senate Republicans anti-Obama strategy of filibustering everything. Sadly, we're going to be getting just what we deserve.

Ryan would have Stiffed Janesville's ability to get Economic Stimulus Help. Ungrateful Hometown Boy?

Janesville is now getting a look at the real Paul Ryan, the one who hasn't lifted a finger to save even one company from closing or moving overseas. As John Nichols said on Sly in the Morning:



Romney's VP running mate Rep. Paul Ryan denied at first, then claimed he didn't remember, asking for stimulus money to help two hometown businesses in Janesville. Now, Ryan says he probably would not have done anything to help...see for yourself:

AP/Bloombergbusinessweek: Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan on Thursday reversed course and acknowledged lobbying the government for millions of dollars in economic stimulus money after twice denying he had done so ... he had forgotten that his office sent letters — with his signature — to the Energy and Labor departments asking for money from the stimulus program on behalf of two companies in his home state.

"They should have been handled differently, and I take responsibility for that," Ryan said in a written statement released only after he again denied requesting stimulus funds Thursday in an Ohio television interview.

Ryan blamed a "staffer" for the mistaken help to Janesville. Here's Ed Schultz, the Nation Magazine's John Nichols, and the Progressive Magazine's Ruth Conniff :

Ryan took Janesville Stimulus, thanked Administration for "stimulating the local economy by creating new jobs." Doh!

Lawrence O'Donnell has all the details, in this shortened video clip, where he catches Paul Ryan in one big lie about the stimulus. Ryan vilified the stimulus as a total waste of money. But Ryan's claim that government doesn't create jobs...well, that's not what he's saying behind the scenes. Boy, I'm liking the national spotlight.

Ryan’s response: “If Congressman Ryan is asked to help a Wisconsin entity applying for existing federal grant funds, he does not believe flawed policy should get in the way of doing his job.”

But that's not walking the walk, now is it?

Ryan projection: "Obama is trying to paint us as a caricature...as if we're some bizarre individualists..."

Republican VP pick Paul Ryan is now trying to turn everything completely around on the Democrats, flipping reality on its head. From "We built it" to the "radical Obama agenda."

Few media reporters have noticed that the Republican and Paul Ryan have been controlling the nations purse string for two years. So how did Obama spend so much? He didn't. 

But the stimulus was a success, and Republican politicians fell all over themselves touting new jobs and businesses that were helped by the government money. Yet the stimulus was a failure.  

But the following is perhaps too much, even for wildly partisan tea party low information voters (I can dream). According to the Post’s Greg Sargent: 

Now that Paul Ryan has been tapped as Mitt Romney’s veep candidate, he’ll take on an elevated role as a critic of Obama’s stimulus package. Janesville, Wis., where he still lives, is recovering economically in no small part because of money from the stimulus and other federal grants.

There’s the Janesville Innovation Center, which will “provide entrepreneurs with commercial space in which to launch their ideas.” This is being funded by a $1.2 million stimulus grant, Lizza notes. That’s not all. As Lizza notes, the federal government is contributing more than $10 million to a new facility in Janesville that will produce a medical tracer that used to be made outside the United States. The new plant could employ some 150 people.

John Beckford, the head of a local economic development group and a Ryan supporter, explained to Lizza how Janesville is reinventing itself after a GM plant closed in the town. 

Beckford is your typical hypocritical conservative ideologue and Ryan voter. Republicans don’t care about spending really, just when somebody else does it.  

Ryan has been pounding away at Obama’s “didn’t build that” speech. When Lizza pointed out to Ryan that this seems at odds with the fact that federal spending is helping drive his home town’s economic recovery, Ryan didn’t disagree.

Ryan: “Obama is trying to paint us as a caricature. As if we’re some bizarre individualists who are hard-core libertarians. It’s a false dichotomy and intellectually lazy.”

In reality, what all this shows is that it is Romney and Ryan who are painting a caricature of Obama’s views, positions and policies.

Interstate Highway System wouldn’t have been built if Republicans and Paul Ryan had their way!!

The Republican Party lacks VISION...that would in turn creates jobs.

Have Republicans no sense of history? Had the government not stepped in to build our rail system initially, and then later our interstate highways, would we still be waiting for the private sector to take the lead? Yes.

That’s just what the Republicans, lead by Paul Ryan, are suggesting, when they came out against transportation and any high speed rail project.

Detroit News: (The) bill would cut transportation spending by a quarter, and would end all high-speed rail funds, saying they have "failed numerous and clear cost-benefit analyses." The budget says the government can't afford the projects. "However worthy some highway projects might be, their capacity as job creators has been vastly oversold…”

When the transcontinental rail system was build, most of those jobs only lasted a few years. What a waste of money, huh?

But here’s the clincher:

“…with the federal government's fiscal challenges making long-term subsidization infeasible, high-speed rail and other new intercity rail projects should be pursued only if they can be established as self-supporting commercial services," the GOP budget proposal says.

Which in the big picture would rule out the interstate system and transcontinental rail system; because even today they continued to drain taxpayer money for maintenance and upkeep?

Penny wise, pound foolish fact for Ryan:

Before the building of the Transcontinental Railroad, it cost nearly $1,000 dollars to travel across the country. After the railroad was completed, the price dropped to $150 dollars.

Since Republican/Bush tax policies are still in effect, why is GOP blaming Obama for economy? Rep. Blackburn stumped.

Rep. Marsha Blackburn is not a smart person. Her embarrassing appearances on Hardball are jaw dropping, like the example below. She substitutes lots of words for actual cohesive thoughts.

Blackburn whines that there wasn't enough infrastructure money in the first stimulus bill, never realizing it was her party that took that "not so shovel ready" work out for more tax cuts. Thankfully Rep. Tim Ryan was there to reminded both Blackburn and Chris Matthews. Blackburn, even then, never really got the message.

Blackburn utters "I think it's amazing that you continue to blame it on George Bush" when posed with this great question from Chris:

Matthews: "We're living basically under the tax policies of George W. Bush, you passed that tax cut, it's still in effect, the economy is in terrible shape right now, isn't President Bush responsible? It's your tax structure, it isn't President Obama's tax structure. He said he didn't like this tax structure. It's yours, and this is your economy. Why do you keep blaming it on Obama when he hasn't been able to change the tax policy?"

Hey Democrats, sounds like a great line to repeat over and over in campaigns from now until November 2012.

A Tale of Two Ryan's. Follow the "Leader" Economics

This amazing piece by Ezra Klein will explain a lot about the contrarian nature of Paul Ryan and the Republican Tea Party. Ryan is an unintentional hypocrite? Maybe.

It has become common today for Republicans to deride the very concept of stimulus as absurd, to mock Keynesian economics as an ivory-tower fantasy, and to oppose temporary tax cuts as a recession-fighting measure. But during the Bush administration? All that was orthodox conservative policy.

In 2001, Grover Norquist called a national sales-tax holiday “exactly the kind of immediate stimulus our shell-shocked economy needs now.” Norquist went on to quote George W. Bush’s chief economist, Glenn Hubbard, saying we needed stimulus “sooner rather than later.” Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) introduced a bill to that effect.

Around the same time, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) held a hearing in which he invited Kevin Hassett, a conservative economist based at the American Enterprise Institute, to make the case for a fiscal stimulus. “The economists who studied this were quite surprised to find that fiscal policy in recessions was reasonably effective,” Hassett testified. “It is just that folks tried a first punch that was too light and that generally we didn’t get big measures until well into the recession.”

Ryan was delighted by his answer. “That is precisely my point,” he replied. “That is why I like my porridge hot. I think we ought to have this income tax cut fast, deeper, retroactive to January 1st, to make sure we get a good punch into the economy, juice the economy to make sure that we can avoid a hard landing.”

So not only was it non-controversial that deficit-financed stimulus spending was an effective and desirable way to fight economic downturns, but it was taken as obvious by Paul Ryan — Paul Ryan! — that the big danger was that you did too little. Now, of course, Ryan takes the initial stimulus’s inability to fully combat the recession as evidence of the policy’s failure, even though we now know the recession was deep enough that standard calculations — the sort of calculations Hassett was referring to in his testimony — would have argued for a stimulus of more than $2 trillion.

So what happened?

Some say the explanation for all this is obvious: Republicans want the economy to fail ... How much clearer can it be?

I don’t believe this sort of behavior is quite that cynical. Psychologists and political scientists talk often of a phenomenon known as motivated skepticism. The idea, basically, is that we believe the evidence and arguments we want to believe, and reject ideas and information that undercut our preferences.

My favorite study in this space was by Yale’s Geoffrey Cohen. He had a control group of liberals and conservatives look at a generous welfare reform proposal and a harsh welfare reform proposal. As expected, liberals preferred the generous plan and conservatives favored the more stringent option. Then he had another group of liberals and conservatives look at the same plans, but this time, the plans were associated with parties.

Both liberals and conservatives followed their parties, even when their parties disagreed with their preferences. So when Democrats were said to favor the stringent welfare reform, for example, liberals went right along. Three scary sentences from the piece: “When reference group information was available, participants gave no weight to objective policy content, and instead assumed the position of their group as their own. This effect was as strong among people who were knowledgeable about welfare as it was among people who were not. Finally, participants persisted in the belief that they had formed their attitude autonomously even in the two group information conditions where they had not.”

I tend to think there’s much more motivated skepticism in politics than outright cynicism, much less economic sabotage. But it’s a distinction without a difference, at least so far as policy outcomes go. The bottom line is this: Until quite recently, both parties supported the idea that you combat bad economies with stimulus spending. Now, during an extremely bad economy, the Republican Party has completely abandoned that position. That has left them without plausible solutions — the GOP talks now of things that have very little role in boosting short-term demand, such as deficit reduction and regulatory reform — and has left the Democrats without the votes to pass anything. And that’s left the country deep in the hole. 

Republicans are bad tenants complaining the landlord can't keep up the maintenance!! Imagine a McCain Adminitration.

Ever wonder what the economy would be like without the stimulus, without the Obama administration? Vanity Fair listed what the McCain administration would have NOT done.

Chris Matthews and guests:

Related articles

• Todd Purdum, Vanity Fair Discover McCain the Gluehorse (emptywheel.firedoglake.com)

The Bailout and Stimulus Success; saying it didn't work doesn't make it so...

So how did that bailout and stimulus do? Didn't work? Waste of taxpayer money?

Guess again. Maybe the Democrats in the last month of campaigning can run a few ads with the chart shown her with Rachel Maddow, from a Washington Post piece by Ezra Klein.