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Will the White House Allow Public Comment on the Stimulus?

Submitted by Patrick Ruffini on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 05:14
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During the campaign, Barack Obama promised to post all non-emergency legislation on the White House website for public comment: 

Sunlight Before Signing: Too often bills are rushed through Congress and to the president before the public has the opportunity to review them. As president, Obama will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days.

He has already broken that promise: 

When President Obama signed his first bill without posting it to the Web for five days of public comment, we gave him his first Promise Broken.

For his second bill, Obama signed an expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Fund, which provides health coverage for low-income children. He signed it on Feb. 4, 2009, just hours after it was finalized in Congress.

The compromise "stimulus" package runs 778 pages and the public has only been given 24 hours to review it before a final vote. Obama's promise was meant to address precisely this scenario, though frankly, the 5 days would be a more useful buffer before final passage. Still, the question remains: Will the Obama White House fulfill the President's commitment and post the stimulus bill for five days before the President signs it? 

The White House has tried to weasel out of the promise thusly:

The President remains committed to bringing more transparency to government, and in this spirit the White House will continue to publish legislation expected to come to his desk online for public comment as it moves through Congress.

Nice try, but the commitment here was for a five day buffer between final passage and the President's signature. If the White House can post the text of a bill before it is passed, surely it can do the same after passage as well. Instead, they've decided, for political reasons, to dispense with the five day buffer entirely. 

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Comments

Emergency

Submitted by Sal on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 06:45.

Patrick, according to the white house website, it is for all but non-emergency legislation.  Since this stimulus is the most important emergency piece of legislation ever to come before the congress in our country's 225+ year history, there is no way they can take the time to live up to their promise of transparency.  We need to pass the stimulus.  How can we conservatives want people to lose jobs?  Don't we care about people's jobs?  How can we let a little old thing like a campaign promise get in the way of Obama's attempts to heal the nation?

Think you forgot the ol'  "

Submitted by Charles Martel on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 10:41.

Think you forgot the ol'  " /sarcasm" tag there...

High bar, low bar

Submitted by lgm on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 08:45.

"Where's the outrage?"  That's Bob Dole running against Clinton wondering why people were not upset about Whitewater.  (Of course, Whitewater itself turned out to be a Republican invention, but that's another story.)  Now Ruffini wishes the public would be outraged at Obama's broken promise of openness. 

Living up to campaign promises is a high place to set the bar.  Being more open than the previous President -- the one "base" conservatives called one of the greatest Presidents in history -- that's easy.  It turns out that's all you have to do to keep most Americans happy. 

lgm - Unlike Sal above you,

Submitted by Charles Martel on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 10:48.

lgm - Unlike Sal above you, I'm not going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume your comment was meant as a joke.

I don't know any conservatives who consider GW Bush one of the "greatest Presidents in history."  Nice strawman though.  Most conservatives are disgusted by his runaway spending, his ridiculous attempts at bipartisanship, his lack of backbone in standing up to the liberal agenda and his repeated support for RINOs like Arlen Specter.  Most conservatives only supported George Bush because we believed that he did the right thing in going into Iraq, and because we knew that he was much much much better than any Democrat alternative.

And for you to claim that "living up to campaign promises" is asking too much of Obama, that's pretty telling.  Most conservatives know that he's been lying through his teeth since, well, he ever started talking, but apparently a lot of other people thought he was actually different than pretty much every other politician out there.  Surprise - he's not.  He's a liar like all the rest of them.  He's even been lying to his base.  He's not pulling anyone out of Iraq, he's not closing Gitmo, he's not bringing any sort of transparency or bipartisanship to Washington, he's not excluding lobbyists from his administration, and he's certainly not allowing five days to review this massive debt creating bill.  In a long string of lying politicians that have passed through Washington in the last century, he's certainly no change.

Change to some people is

Submitted by In between on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 13:20.

Change to some people is different things. I suppose the democrats hang on to their beliefs as well as the republicans. So basically there are only two philosophies. The change needed was to get away from the failed supply side economics. We have seen enough of the middle class getting the shaft. McCain would have been more of the same, although somewhat moderate. When you guys figure out on how you save middle class jobs, then that might be the day I vote republican. You have failed and abandoned the middle class.  

"Failed supply side

Submitted by Charles Martel on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 15:58.

"Failed supply side economics"? 

Yeah, the economy and the middle class were barely gimping along back when the Dow reached its all-time high during the Bush years, only a few years after the worst attack on American soil, ever...times were tough.  Those tax cuts he enacted really put a damper on growth. 

Thank god Congress came along and pressured banks to give home loans and extend credit to people who couldn't afford them, that really saved our asses. 

Thank god the entertainment industry has been constantly promoting a lifestyle that people can't afford for the past couple decades. 

Thank god unions are here to ensure that their workers are paid unaffordable pensions and pay scales that make their industries unable to compete, or drive their companies out of business. 

Thank god we have government workers and bureaucrats to get things done at ten times the price and one tenth of the time that it would take private industry.

And thank god that He graced us with the return of his son Barack to jump out behind us and yell "Boo!" to ensure that we can quadruple the national debt in a matter of a few months. 

Republicans have abandoned the middle class?  By what, asking them to take responsibility for their spending and live within their means?  By asking them to find and hold a job instead of leeching off those who do? 

Liberals couldn't care less about the middle class, or the lower class for that matter.  You think that you're helping poor people by teaching them to suckle from the government teat their whole lives?  You think living off welfare is a good thing?  You believe that the government, the same government that runs the DMV, the post office, you think that that government is best suited to run your life? 

What a joke. 

so off topic it's funny

Submitted by cr on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 16:08.

Take a typical Democrat and typical Republican, put them together and you'll get an unrelated rant about whatever both of them tend to rant about. The only thing missing from this thread is derogatory language.

I'd be happy to oblige you with the derogatory language, cr -

Submitted by Charles Martel on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 16:14.

- but I'll leave that to the Dems - thanks so much for your contribution though.

Well. what we do know is that

Submitted by In between on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 16:30.

Well. what we do know is that Bush did the old "guns and butter" trick. LBJ did this and caused 20 years of inflation by having  money printed. Bush had his war and tax cuts, and borrowed the money. Also Bush said for 8 years that "free trade is good" while the middle class loss jobs. While we need free trade, the trade off is that you have to invest in the future to create new jobs. Now the country is in a heck of mess, and will take a miracle to get out of. 

I heartily disagree with your

Submitted by Charles Martel on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 17:27.

I heartily disagree with your final point - it would not take a "miracle" to get out of the current mess the country is in.  It will certainly take some suffering and a lot of sacrifice, but hardly a miracle.  Unfortunately it seems that most people in this country aren't willing to make a sacrifice, they aren't willing to live within their means or to give up luxuries that they've become accustomed to (a bigger house than they need, a nicer car, a bigger tv, etc). 

Even more unfortunate, and what I think is going to ultimately doom this country, at least in the short term, is the fact that our government appears quite willing to enable these same people.  Through bailouts and pork-laden "stimulus" bills, the government is telling people that it's ok to be in debt, we'll just borrow more on top of it and spend our way out of this problem.  There is no way that is going to work.  A ten year old could tell you that.

I certainly won't claim that Bush and the Republican congress over the last eight years did any good in this regard with their own runaway spending, and the left correctly criticized them for it (as did many on the right), but now that the Dems find themselves in power, they compounding Bush's spending with their own, but on a massive scale. 

The "stimulus" bill is not "investing in the future."  It's dumping taxpayer money into a hole in the ground and lighting it on fire while passing the bill on to our children.

perspective

Submitted by chemjeff on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 17:35.

Even more unfortunate, and what I think is going to ultimately doom this country, at least in the short term, is the fact that our government appears quite willing to enable these same people.  Through bailouts and pork-laden "stimulus" bills, the government is telling people that it's ok to be in debt, we'll just borrow more on top of it and spend our way out of this problem.  There is no way that is going to work.  A ten year old could tell you that.

I could not agree with you more.

I certainly won't claim that Bush and the Republican congress over the last eight years did any good in this regard with their own runaway spending, and the left correctly criticized them for it (as did many on the right), but now that the Dems find themselves in power, they compounding Bush's spending with their own, but on a massive scale.

Just to put it in perspective: Bush and the Republican Congress, with their runaway spending ways, increased the federal budget from $1.90 trillion to $2.77 trillion over the course of 6 years, from 2001-2007.  That is an increase of $870 billion.  That included recovering from the worst terrorist attack in this nation's history, creating an entire new department (Homeland Security), prosecuting two wars, Medicare Part D, No Child Left Behind, and various other pork-filled spending bills.

Now, the Democrats want to spend about the same amount of money IN ONE MONTH.  And that's not including the interest on the debt.  And what precisely will we have to show for it at the end?

http://www.cedarcomm.com/~ste

Submitted by In between on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 18:26.

http://www.cedarcomm.com/~stevelm1/usdebt.htm

I don't know where you get your numbers, but they seem erroneous

When Bush took over office, Clinton and Gingrich left a national debt of 5.6 trillion dollars and there was a yearly surplus. After 8 years of Bush, the debt is over 10 trillion dollars and he had yearly deficits throughout.

So that means Bush has added over 4 trillion dollars to the debt and this past yearly deficit is close to 500 billion dollars. And that is not counting the financial bailouts. Bush borrowed for his tax cuts, borrowed for his war, and never cut spending.

Sacrifice? When the middle

Submitted by In between on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 18:38.

Sacrifice? When the middle class lose their jobs? When Bush spends the money on the wrong war? When the tax cuts go to the rich and send the jobs overseas. I will agree we all got fat. But Bush ran this country into the ground.

I can't agree with all the spending the democrats are doing, but it will take trillions of dollars to make up for the lost time for investing in the future and taking care of our infrastructure. Obama is trapped in a corner. The only way out is more deficit spending to save the banks and invest in the future. Even the American Society of Engineers say it will cost 2.2 trillion dollars to fix the infrastructure. You have factories closing and going overseas. People are losing jobs and cities and states are going broke. And our money is going to Iraq.

Now you have had 8 years of tax cuts and we are back into a recession. And the fed has lowered interest rates to their lowest levels. They can do no more. The country is in a total mess. 

 

http://www.asce.org/reportcard/2009/index.html

Credit Card Debt

Submitted by mikeadam on Fri, 04/03/2009 - 00:28.

 Let’s say you found out that your child has thousands of debt in their credit card, will you save him or her? As a parent, maybe it’s normal for you to wish an easier life for your kids. However, it doesn’t mean that they’re not allowed to learn a few lessons from time to time. After all, problems and challenges are the ones that mold us to become better.

------------------------------------------------------------------

mikadam

<a href="http://www.stop-credit-card-debt.com/">Credit Card Debt</a>

Credit Card Debt

Submitted by mikeadam on Fri, 04/03/2009 - 00:29.

 Let’s say you found out that your child has thousands of debt in their credit card, will you save him or her? As a parent, maybe it’s normal for you to wish an easier life for your kids. However, it doesn’t mean that they’re not allowed to learn a few lessons from time to time. After all, problems and challenges are the ones that mold us to become better.

------------------------------------------------------------------

mikadam

http://www.stop-credit-card-debt.com

Conservatives who love Bush

Submitted by lgm on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 20:50.

I don't know any conservatives who consider GW Bush one of the "greatest Presidents in history."

William Kristol, Ann Coulter, and Rush Limbaugh come to mind.

 

clearly a campaign promise.

Submitted by cr on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 16:11.

Hopefully not much hay will be made of this, but no president wants public debate on a bill. I'm not sure what would happen even if it did happen. I can't imagine a bill being recrafted after poster #4567 points out a flaw in section 5635 article 567 of bill #483858609.

Lord help us if we ever have that much Democracy. The best place to have made fun of this is during the debates when someone in the audience coughed, 'buusht" out loud just after he promised it. I would have anyway . . . even if it would have gotten me tossed.

 . . and if only it would have been caught on youtube. I could've been as famous a Joe Warztulwhatever.

Did you even look?

Submitted by kasda on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 23:39.

Given that most of the white house staff didn't even have phone or email access their first week in office, i'm willing to cut the administration some slack, just as i'm willing to cut you some slack for failing to mention that the Obama administration has in fact posted the DTV delay bill online for comment. 

http://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing_room/dtv_delay_act/

Carry on the flame war....

Mistake

Submitted by freebyrd68 on Tue, 02/10/2009 - 00:09.

Sorry, I though the New York Times was the only one who really believed this guy.

Realtor

Submitted by TysonL on Wed, 05/06/2009 - 22:58.

Change to some people is different things. Both democrats and republicans hang on to their beliefs. So basically there are only two philosophies. The change needed was to get away from the failed supply side economics. We have seen enough of the middle class getting the shaft. McCain would have been more of the same, although somewhat moderate. I just hope that sooner we can have our economy back to its stability. In relation to economy issues, a realtor is a good profession to have, at least at times. A realtor during a housing boom can rake in the cash, especially if they’re able to work in an expensive market. Did you know about Marin County? It is the county of the North Bay Area around San Francisco.  Unfortunately, it is also close to Oakland.  However, with the housing market being what it is, you can't get a house for really cheap in California with poor credit, even with a payday loan to help out with a deposit.  Still, some in the realtor trade are resorting to installment loans to keep afloat.