2/16/2009

New Fox News Op-ed: Is It Worth $62,000 to You?

My new Fox News piece story is here:

The stimulus bill had to be passed quickly. President Obama warned that not passing it would result in disaster. He warned that any delay was “inexcusable.” The 1,071 page stimulus bill had to be voted on quickly -- so quickly this last week that the House and the Senate couldn’t even provide politicians the 48 hours they were supposed to have to read it.

The legislation was not put up on the web until 11 PM on Thursday evening, and the House passed it just 12 hours later. The Senate started voting on it only hours after that. Politician after politician admitted or complained that it was physically impossible to read the bill. As it was, the copies available on the web for voters had all sorts of hand markings on it that sometimes made it difficult to figure out exactly what the bill proposed.

Despite all this pressure, Obama seems rather laid back after the bill was passed – he doesn’t plan the signing ceremony until Tuesday. As the New York Post noted, after passage, Obama “promptly took off for a three-day holiday getaway.” Possibly, Obama’s vacation was well deserved, but why couldn’t Congress have held debate and votes over the weekend or Monday and to allow some time to read the bill? . . . .

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3 Comments:

Blogger Rick L said...

The eerie parallel that no one has yet noticed is that there was a 1971 movie entitled "The Man," starring James Earl Jones as the nation's first African-American president. In that movie, Jones' character goes out and delivers his first press conference, answering questions by reading from prepared notes.

Life imitates art? Maybe not so much...in the movie, Jones' character was lambasted by the press for using the notes.

2/16/2009 7:09 PM  
Blogger Harry Schell said...

Remember also that Queen Nancy had a plane to catch for her European trip...I think part of the itinerary is to explain abortion to some backward guy called the Pope. Delaying the vote would have delayed her triumphant vacation to Italy.

And why read the bill, anyway. Bama, Pelosi and Reid said vote for it...anything else to worry about?

2/16/2009 7:53 PM  
Blogger gth871r said...

Well deserved vacation. That poor guy never gets a break. He's been on the job for almost four weeks!

2/16/2009 10:14 PM  

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