Friday, February 06, 2009

Spending Isn't Stimulus

I know I should never stop being surprised at how stupid Republicans want our political debate to be, but I just can't.

There better and worse ways to spend money, both in terms of how sensible projects are and how much of a stimulative effect those expenditures will have, but all spending is stimulus.

Paying people to dig holes and then fill them up again would be stupid spending, but it would still be very effective stimulus.

Allocating money to build SUPERTRAINS would be smart spending, IMHO, though potentially (depending) not a super-effective stimulus.

So ideally you have projects which are both smart spending and good stimulus, but spending is the stimulus.

Morons.