Spend to Save?

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AP - President Barack Obama is sending Congress a $3.73 trillion spending blueprint that pledges $1.1 trillion in deficit savings over the next decade through spending cuts and tax increases.

Excuse me? Spend $3.73 TRILLION to save $1.1 TRILLION over 10 years!? 

#1. Unless the plan is to limit and or cut entitlement programs no control is real or sustainable.

#2. Raising taxes will only hurt those who pay the taxes which ALWAYS turns out to be the middle classes (=me, you). 

#3. Sending money to the federal government to dole out back to the states is just a massive money laundering operation and waste of tax payers money.

#4. When a politician (whatever the party) says investment what they mean is payout to a group of people to ensure they will get re-elected.

The facts of life are that money spent is money gone or money owed and savings is only savings if it is actual money in an actual place.

In LA It's Stimul-less not Stimulate

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Sometimes the simplicity of the truth makes the complexity of the absurd, well, absurd. The $111million in stimulus finds received by Los Angeles has produced 55 jobs! That's lottery winning odds of getting a job as the result of stimulus funds. There should be a movie line I can quote where the actor says (with appropriate Southern drawl), "What we have here, is a failure to stimulate."

The old saying goes: "You can give a man a fish and feed him for a day, or teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime." A look at the jobs that are supposed to be being stimulated are fish rather than fishing lessons. Here is a sample of some jobs LA is hoping to stimulate. 

Among these are restriping left-turn lanes, replacing old traffic lights with energy-efficient LED signals, improving traffic signal safety at grade crossings and improving Commuter Express and DASH bus services. - Daily Breeze

Before the jobs are even created there is the biggest obstacle to the whole mess. The usual culprit for creating waste is the government. There is Federal, State and City bureaucratic red tape to be navigated. Supposedly, many jobs are lost in the red tape. They are being planned. 55 people are no longer waiting.

Governments do not create jobs. Entrepreneurs create businesses which create jobs. When the government tries to take the place of free market enterprise you get Cuba. People don't stand in line for jobs in Cuba, they stand in line for bread. I don't want to stand in line for bread. The way to create jobs is to allow businesses to flourish. The so-called "stimulus" package is just fish for a day.

So, it looks to me like it has, as predicted, become a "stimu-less" package.