Highway Update, and Micropolises

First, an Obama-driven update on the highway projects in the stimulus bill, based on an article in the Los Angeles Times. Obama noted recently that highway projects are "ahead of schedule and under budget". The article goes on to point out some of the chief reason
Of course, in California, some of these highway investments are going to rural areas such as a bridge in Mendocino County, rather all going to choked urban areas in desperate need (In full disclosure, millions are also going to the 710). And the investment in small-town, McCain America brings me to the second part of this week's blogpost...micropolises.

A micropolis is, according to C. Kenneth Orski, a area neither suburban nor the rural, often centering around a city of around 10,000, and it's the only portion of my key stakeholder segment of my policy presentation not yet covered in this blog. Believe it, I actually learned about this on AIMZones...proving that they are actually useful for something more than celebrity dish. Since metropolitan areas are usually defined by counties, defined micropolises appear in places with small counties, namely the South and Midwest, though in reality micropolises dot the entire country (for example, Parlier, CA, might qualify as a micropolis, but as it's in Fresno County, it's automatically-and unfairly-grouped into the Fresno Metro Area just as Needles is into the San Bernardino). As I stated in the presentation, both micropolises and metropolises will benefit from the stimulus package. Micropolises will benefit from the money that is being sunk into rural roads and rural broadband, and perhaps some micropolises will one day become metropolises, as Visalia did.




By the way, I reopened most of my Purple Backpack Polls--they're open until the end of the month. From the Occidental intramural basketball tournament, I'm the Ferdey coach for the Purple Backpack Politics Blog.

Analyzing Obama's State of the Union and Budget

Two important events took place this week: President Obama proposed his budget and he delivered his first message to Congress. A Los Angeles Times article noted that Obama's budget "included broad goals and few line items", and the same could pretty much be said for his speech. The three issues he focused on were energy, health care and education. On the face of it, none of those issues are infrastructure. In fact, there was less about infrastructure in Obama's speech than in the speech of Louisiana governor Kenneth Parcell, er, Bobby Jindal. Jindal criticized Obama and Congress' massive appropriation for infrastructure, highlighting the Anaheim-to-Las Vegas high speed rail project (More on that in a future post). Infrastructure made its main entrance in Obama's speech subtly in the energy and education, where Obama highlighted his green energy plans and singled out a crumbling school in Dillon, SC.

Full Text of Obama's Address to Congress

Looking at Obama's budget, the first thing Republicans, including David Brooks, cry foul about is that its percentage of GDP inches us closer to Europe. (To that, I counter that we NEED massive gov't spending in ALL AREAS. This morning's LA Times had an interesting schematic showing the differences in funding between Obama's budget and the last Bush budget. Unfortunately, I couldn't find it on the 'Net. I will note, however, the most important difference to funding--an increase in the outlay to the Department of Transportation by more than $60B, with much of that increase coming in the stimulus package.

This Week on the Blog Front

This blog is a compilation of several interesting articles I read in the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, and the Huffington Post.

One article in today's Los Angeles Times compares the public works projects built by the WPA and other FDR New Deal agencies to Obama's infrastructure projects, and notes that the projects built THIS:

Grand Coulee Dam in WA

and THIS:

La Guardia Airport, Triborough Bridge

and even THIS:

Whittier High School Auditorium

It goes on to note that Obama's plan creates very few of these monumental projects, with the possible exception of high-speed rail. I would note that high-speed rail is a very important exception (more on the high-speed rail debate later), would disagree with the Times that some of our infrastructure projects are not , and would hope that sooner or later, Obama builds the new infrastructure

Either way, Obama's stimulus/infrastructure package was the main subject of the Governors' Meeting over the weekend, according to a recent New York Times article. Most governors, Democratic and Republican, support Obama on the stimulus package, the most noteworthy Republican crossing lines being our own Arnold Schwarzenegger, who had to take the stimulus money just to balance the budget (For that, the California "I'm-Too-Conservative to-Care-About-the-Public-Good" Republican Party is giving him a vote of no confidence).

The Republican governors who oppose the stimulus package the most, and have hinted they might refuse some or all of the money include Mark Sanford, Bobby Jindal, and Sarah Palin (Where have I heard those names before? Oh, yeah...they're all running for Prez in 2012). According to the Huffington Post, Obama is now taking shots at state governments who oppose him. You can watch the video at the Huffington Post link.

And finally, a recent ABC News poll analyzed Obama's first month. Here are some of their key findings:

*People think Obama was trying to compromise with Republicans by a
3:1 margin, but think that Republicans weren't trying to compromise with Obama, 59-34

*Support for the stimulus plan is 64% overall, but only one in three among Republicans

*Obama holds a 68% approval rating, and an identical 68% of Americans say Obama has brought "Change to Washington"

*The % of Americans who think the country is on the right track has doubled since the election, but is only at 31%

*People think that the stimulus will help their local economy much more than the economy as a whole

~~~~

I Wonder, Wonder, Wonder, What's in this Wonder Bill?

As you've undoubtedly heard, the stimulus bill has passed both houses of Congress, passing in the House with no Republican support, and in the Senate with the support of only three blue-state Republicans. This means that Boehner's gamble has paid off in the House, but the stimulus bill will have to be percieved as a failure for it to pay off completely. Seven blue-dog Democrats defected, and hopefully they'll be primaried out in 2010. In analysis on the News Hour with Jim Lehrer, syndicated columnist Mark Shields thinks that it was a major success for Obama and the American people, while New York Times correspondent David Brooks thinks that too many people are not satisfied with this bill. The Los Angeles Times, and the author of this blog, tend to side with Shields on this one, pointing out that the stimulus even the Republicans concede that the bill will create or preserve at least 3.46 million jobs. The author would like to add that one important function of this bill is creating jobs in every industry, yes, including the arts industry. View NPR Coverage.

Here's a visual that shows what's in this "Wonder Bill". As you can see, $85.7 billion (or about $300 for each person in America) is allocated towards infrastructure. Of this, $46B is allocated towards fixing our highway network, and get almost $10B apiece.

Now that the stimulus bill has been passed, the direction of this blog will change slightly, to how infrastructure spending is being used to help the economy, or how lack of infrastructure spending is hurting the economy.

This blog post is brought to you by Nestle.

Senate Bill Passes Senate...On to Conference Committee

Yes, the stimulus package passed the House by a vote of 61-37, with only Collins, Snowe and Specter supporting it (the total does not add up to 100 because Gregg sat it out and the Minnesota seat is still vacant). Though the only Senators to support the measure (Snowe, Collins, Specter) came from states that comfortably voted for Obama last November, this means that part of Boehner's gamble hasn't paid off. In a post-passage news conference, Sens. McConnell (R-KY) and Kyl (R-AZ) attacked the bill for turning the United States into a Socialist county like the rest of the industrialized world, and roasted the amount of (including "pork" for improving our schools and energy grid!). You can view it here, or you can also get the link by clicking on the picture of the vote.

Coverage by the Los Angeles Times
Coverage by C-SPAN
Coverage by National Public Radio

Now that the bill has passed, it goes to conference committe, where the major differences between House and Senate versions, deliniated below


Personally, I hope the conference committee sides with the House on most of the issues--you'll note that the House has allocation more money for infrastructure (the actual subject of this blog), as the bipartisan committee decided to cut the spending on infrastructure improvements suchs as roads, schools, and broadband technogoly. This is very unfortunate, since sectors that would be put to work by those measures (i.e. home construction) have been among the worst hit by the recession. The elite chamber also slashes funding to states, which are in worse shape than the federal government and have to fund most of the infrastructure projects not funded by the feds. The one thing I side with the elite chamber on is increased spending to bring our green energy grid into the 21st century, curtail our dependence on foreign oil, and decrease the trade deficit that is a major cause of the recession.

Yes, readers, I tend to side with BIGGER numbers, because I'm a big-government tax-and-spend hippie Greepeace Liberal pinko Commie Socialist...and I feel that bigger spending will give the First Tiger the appearance of actually doing something.

And that's today's rant. Coming up, I report on the conference committee's findings, and I channel Prometheus.

A New Tactic, and Political Capital

The new Republican tactic—not calling the stimulus package a stimulus package, but a spending bill. Defeated presidential candidate Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) used this tactic in interviews Wednesday, and it was adopted by fellow spending hawk Tom Coburn (R-OK) on the floor yesterday morning—he claimed that Obama’s stimulus package would not create a single job. I would like Obama to find that person who gets that job and invite him to the White House, just to prove that Coburn was wrong and Mark Shields was right about the death of conservatism. Anyway, the GOP’s tactic seems to be working—though three-quarters of the population support a stimulus package (down from before Obama took office), half of its supporters think it needs “major changes”. McCain yesterday proposed an amendment to cut the stimulus monies in half—in the Republicans’ view, the half cut would mostly be “fat”, and the infrastructure spending that is the root of this blog. The half cut is not to be, but earlier tonight it was announced that the Senate has agreed to cut at least $85B in “fat”—in other words, funding for education and the arts, and aid to the embattled states mentioned in the previous blog.

A word about political capital at this point—I know the concept is mostly associated with President Bush, but it could also be associated with Obama. Obama has been forced by the Republicans to buckle down and burn a lot of his political capital on this stimulus bill (not to mention from the tax questions of his Cabinet), appearing on every major network and now stump-speaking in the battlegrounds of Florida and Indiana. The Republicans are going to lose the infrastructure fight (a foregone conclusion), but, unfortunately for us liberals, they have made it easier to win the next one. For coverage of the next one, keep watching this blog

Also, take a look at this NewsHour interview with David Axelrod

I’ll Take the Future of the Republican Party on Evens, Red

As you have probably heard, the House version of the stimulus bill, with the infrastructure funding attached, passed Wednesday by a vote of 244-188. The bill included a last-minute amendment by Reps. DeFazio of Oregon and Nadler of New York to add an additional $4.5 billion dollars to the package, including $3 billion for rail and mass transit projects. The Senate takes up its version on Monday.

Thanks to House Minority Leader John Boehner’s continued cries that Republicans should stick to their small-government guns and ignore the will of the VAST MAJORITY OF THE PEOPLE, REPUBLICAN AND DEMOCRAT, no Republicans voted for the bill. By doing this, Boehner is making a fairly substantial gamble…and the fate of the Republican Party likely hangs in the balance.

There are several caveats that will have to be met for Boehner’s gamble to pay dividends for the Republican Party:

1. A unified alternative will need to be put forth by the GOP. According to an article in today’s LA Times, the Republicans are anti-Obama’s massive spending on infrastructure and related projects, but have yet to come up with a unified front of what to do instead, so that they’ll have actions to point at should the infrastructure plan fail. If you’re a Republican, you have to hope that Boehner, Palin, or new GOP chair Michael Steele (elected earlier today) will be able to rally the GOP behind a single issue.
2. Bipartisanship will have to fail. Despite the vote in the House, there’s still a pretty good chance that some GOPs will support Barack on the infrastructure package before the bill creeps to its inevitable passage, either from moderate Republican Senators who come from centrist or Democratic states (Olympia Snowe being the most likely culprit), or in either house after the bill has been altered in conference committee. If Obama gets GOP support, he can tout that he has changed the culture in Washington at least somewhat, thereby fulfilling his main campaign promise.
3. They will have to run a governor on the GOP presidential ticket in 2012. No way will any legislator obstructionist to the infrastructure package have any chance in hell against perhaps the most popular and unifying man in the history of the world, excluding Jesus Christ.
4. And this is the hard one: HOPE THAT THE INFRASTRUCTURE BILL FAILS. The Republicans are already banking on this, as they are running an ad slamming Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, whom they hope to pick off in 2010, for supporting the infrastructure bill. If the bill fails to get us out of the recession, Obama will look like an idiot and the GOP will take back Congress and the White House right? WRONG!!!! As with FDR, if Obama makes by creating SOME jobs and refitting our infrastructure, people will re-elect him even if the recession doesn’t end. Of course, as with the post-New Deal era, Republicans will probably eventually regain control of Congress…it just will take two decades for it to happen, and two generations to stick.

Here’s more coverage on the stimulus issue, for your viewing pleasure

• From National Public Radio
• From the LA Times
• From the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer
• From the Deanist blog mydd.com

Oh, and one more thing…

Congratulations to the next President of Occidental College, Jonathan Veitch!!!!!!

The Infastructure Issue: One Week in

OK, everybody knows about this:

And you probably know that he's proposed a massive stimulus package that is now hovering at the number $900 billion, and will include everything from middle-class tax cuts to millions for the National Endownment for the Arts. My policy blog focuses on the over $350 billion appropriated for "shovel-ready" infrastructure projects, as well as other legislation relating to transit and infrastructure on primarily the national level. According to one op-ed article by center-right pollster Frank Luntz, infrastructure is a unifying issue in America, in such a way as few other issues are. According to Luntz, 94% of Americans, including vast majorities from almost every grouping there is, express concern about the nation's infrastructure. 84% support more funding for it, and 81% of Americans, including 3 out of 4 Republicans, support a 1% tax increase for infrastructure spending (this in a country where substantial majorities support lower taxes). So it is clear that there is a consensus for Obama to do something about our crumbling infrastructure.

The stimulus package, including the billions for infrastructure, is snaking its way through the house and the senate, despite concerns from Senator John McCain and House Minority Leader John Boehner, who criticize Obama's plan for not coalescing to them enough (they forget that two and half months ago, a mandate was handed down AGAINST them and their party). Boehner and McCain's criticism targets the large amounts of spending in the Democrats' bill, but not specifically the infrastructure money. (Their focus is more on fringe issues, like funding for contraceptives and the NEA). Here are a few links to media coverage of the debate in Congress over the stimulus package since the 23rd:

• From the Times, 1/23
• From Politico, 1/25
• From the Times, 1/25
• From National Public Radio, 1/25
• From the Times, 1/26

By the way, should you want to fact-check any of my information or browse the web for additional information, my main news source is the Los Angeles Times, but others I read regularly include National Public Radio, The News Hour with Jim Lehrer (which I will almost always watch over the Hannity Show that's scheduled opposite it), The Atlantic and TIME. Occasionally, I might reference the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, Politico or Bill Moyers' Journal.