Without Reading, Congressional Democrats Ram Through Porkfest

There's no other way you can describe this mess. The Democrats own this porkfest that will cost trillions of dollars going forward, not the $789 billion price tag that Democrats and the media are spinning. These are commitments to spend that amount and don't include the interest and inflationary pressures that this massive porkfest will bring.

It undermines market determinations of salary, which is a populist move by Congress and one that many Democrats think didn't go far enough in limiting executive compensation (Rep. Barney Frank D-economic illiterate, I'm talking to you). It is a socialist move to limit compensation and one where the government dictates how much you can make.

For all the talk about how this mess provides tax relief to millions of taxpayers, the sad truth is that states and localities have already spoken for the $400-$800 and more through tax hikes. In New York and New Jersey, reductions or eliminations of property tax relief mean that taxpayers are going to see government demand hundreds or thousands more than the pittance Obama provides. It is a shell game.

Things were close in the Senate where the White House had to fly in Sen. Sherrod Brown from his mother's wake to cast the deciding vote.

The Senate finally adopted the bill at 10:47 p.m. after what appeared to be the longest Congressional vote in history. The peculiar 5-hour 17-minute process was required because Senator Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio, had to return to Washington from his home state after attending a funeral home visitation for his mother, who died Feb. 2.

Under a procedural deal between the parties, the bill needed 60 votes to pass. The vote began at 5:30 p.m., but from 7:07 p.m., when Senator Evan Bayh, Democrat of Indiana, cast his “aye,” the tally hung at 59 to 38, until Mr. Brown arrived.

Mr. Obama is expected to sign the bill on Monday.

Among the senators voting against it was Judd Gregg, Republican of New Hampshire, who withdrew this week as the president’s nominee for commerce secretary.

Despite the bill’s promise of increased unemployment benefits and new health care subsidies, as well as more than $100 billion in aid for states, House Republicans did not break rank. Even those from states hit hardest by the recession opposed the bill, in a rebuke of the new president.

During the debate, the Republican leader, Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, angrily dropped the 1,073-page bill text to the floor with a thump, as he accused Democrats of failing to read the legislation.

It is curious though that the New York Times admits that the tax cuts are fast acting, while the overwhelming majority of the bill is going to take far longer to have an effect on the economy:

The $787 billion plan — a combination of fast-acting tax cuts and longer-term government spending on public works projects, education, health care, energy and technology — was smaller than Democrats first proposed.

The reason this bill ended up smaller was because the Democrats cut more from the tax relief than they did from the pork portion of the bill.

That's right folks, the one area that the Times admits would cause immediate benefit was cut by the Democrats to get the price of this mess down. The Democrats are economic illiterates and even the Times is forced to notice.

And no one who voted on this mess actually read it. They voted like lemmings to show that they are doing something about the recession (which has happened before and will happen again as a natural cycle of economic growth and contraction) but have gone on to produce the most expensive piece of legislation in world history - outspending even the Manhattan Project and the New Deal. The 111th Congress shall live in infamy, not that they care since all of their pork dreams have been realized, including Harry Reid's billions for a high speed rail project between California and Las Vegas.

Of course, the media will call this a major victory for Obama, even though claims of bipartisanship went out the window and has provided the GOP with the means to reclaim seats in 2010 because of the fiscally irresponsible pork-laced "stimulus". Obama too shall live in infamy for his economic disaster foisted upon the nation.