Obama pleads for $50 billion in state, local aid

[IndianaGreen]

Source: Washington Post

Obama pleads for $50 billion in state, local aid

By Lori Montgomery
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, June 13, 2010

President Obama urged reluctant lawmakers Saturday to quickly approve nearly $50 billion in emergency aid to state and local governments, saying the money is needed to avoid "massive layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters" and to support the still-fragile economic recovery.

In a letter to congressional leaders, Obama defended last year's huge economic stimulus package, saying it helped break the economy's freefall, but argued that more spending is urgent and unavoidable. "We must take these emergency measures," he wrote in an appeal aimed primarily at members of his own party.

The letter comes as rising concern about the national debt is undermining congressional support for additional spending to bolster the economy. Many economists say more spending could help bring down persistently high unemployment, but with Republicans making an issue of the record deficits run up during the recession, many Democratic lawmakers are eager to turn off the stimulus tap.

"I think there is spending fatigue," House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) said recently. "It's tough in both houses to get votes."

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/12/AR2010061204152.html?hpid=topnews

[Skittles]

1. stop the wars

[Lugnut]

12. +1000 n/t

[mike_c]

25. bingo!

:hi:

[defendandprotect]

2. Obama should have at the least overturned Bush tax cuts on wealthy ...

not to mention, he should stop the wars which are bankrupting our Treasury!!

[Iowa]

3. That tired old line needs some tweaking...

"...to avoid massive layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters"

Teachers... check
Firefighters... check

But with the steady stream of news about police harassing, murdering, and brutalizing innocent citizens, go ahead and lay them off. The country would be better off with a lot more teachers and a lot fewer cops.

In other words, get current with the times and stop lumping firefighters and teachers in with cops. The public's support for cops has plummeted like a stone, as it should.

[wordpix]

4. well apparently you don't live in a large city, where I personally like to see cops

on the beat

[Skittles]

13. ditto

[cowman]

21. My daughter is a Las Vegas Metro cop

and she is a good cop, I happen to be a Las Vegas Firefighter/Paramedic and I am no better than the cops so take your anti cop attitude elsewhere.
The vast majority of police officers are hard working dedicated people trying to make their communities safer and just because a few bad apples make them look bad doesn't mean all cops are bad, on behalf of myself and my daughter and all good cops, F**k off

[bitchkitty]

27. Speak for yourself.

I live in a city, and if there were no police here, I'd leave.

[toopers]

29. What percentage of the cops do you think are "bad cops"?

eom

[wordpix]

5. it's the wars, stupid

[Kringle]

6. we spend too much money overseas .nt

[Richard Steele]

11. Really? How so? Please, take a moment to tell us what you mean by your comment.

nm

[Earth_First]

17. Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel, XYZ missle defense program, outsourcing to China...

It's a pretty long list actually.

[cowman]

22. Fuck that

we spend too much money period. Sooner or later we are going to have to pay the piper.

[madrchsod]

7. illinois is losing 600 state police by the end of the year....

that`s just one of the public service cuts across the state.

[SILVER__FOX52]

8. SPENDING FATIGUE....

Bite me! If Congress fails, to continue helping the unemployed, until the economy is up and running again, fails to help the States with their budgets and fails to continue major stimulus programs, especially infra-structure, The Country WILL have a double dip recession and I guarantee you, the Voters are NOT going to give a good, God damn, about the Country's deficit. If the Congress doesn't see this, it borders on treason, in my opinion.

[cowman]

23. Treason?

Trying to curb the out of control spending is treason?
You had better learn what treason really is.

All this out of control spending is putting this country into the poorhouse.

[Name removed]

26. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[cowman]

28. Ohhhhhhhhhhhh

that hurt, once again, you have no clue what treason is, yes the Bush Admin. did overspend and now the Obama Admin is doing the same fucking thing, so just because he's a Dem it's OK? Everyone in DC should be voted out of office and sent packing.
BTW, enjoy your stay at DU which I suspect won't be long because of your language towards other DU'ers

[Jefferson23]

9. I hope you get it Obama, folks need help.

[depakid]

10. Shouldn't have agreed to cut that aid out of the last package

You were warned by tons of people and Nobel prizewinners about the consequences of doing that....

Instead, you and the Senate "leadership" gave in to the extortionists who wanted nothing more than to "starve the beast."

[fasttense]

14. President Obama may have a better chance of passing funding

bills to help with the Great Recession, once the 2nd economic crash occurs. Here's to finding silver linings.

[madrchsod]

15. oh is`t that nice...he`s "pleading". well it`s better than "begging"...

oh wait a minute, now he`s "urging"

give lori a big feather in her cap for writing that lead-in....

[eilen]

16. They are not afraid of the hordes of angry citizens

marching on them. Oh yeah, they don't believe we'll do it. They think we are invisible and mute and truly, other than the 2008 election, we have been.

[mikita]

18. just call us the Bank of USA and we'll be too big to fail,

and then all of Congress will throw trillions at us! Forget these measly billions!

Oh, an added bonus -- we won't even have to stop all the wars!!


HUGE sarcasm thingy.....

[Francisco]

19. Obama is too busy trying..

to sloppily keep together a broken system that has failed time and time again and is too busy trying to appease the uber-capitalists and conservative repubs that he forgot who he was campaigning for. He forgot who voted him into office.

Avoiding "massive layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters" sounds good on the surface, but he has failed to restructure our system like he promised, he has failed to make any CHANGE and PROGRESS like he campaigned for. So whats he doing to save these jobs? Throw more money around and get us further into debt, while adding more to our defense budget and keeping all corporate tax cuts. I guess that BP and Goldman Sachs campaign money did the trick.

[joanmj]

20. Absolutely!

[Ter]

24. A nicer sounding bailout

n/t

[joe black]

30. That's the problem.

Pleading for something when you're the POTUS. LBJ would not plead.