ARARA

I bitched and moaned that the stimulus needed to be a lot bigger, not smaller. And since I went to the Harvard on the Appomattox, anyone who went to Harvard would probably agree with me.

The point here is that contrary to the impression fostered by the right of a grasping federal government crushing everything, all increases in federal spending have been doing lately is partially offsetting recession-induced declines in state and local government spending. Those declines are very economically damaging. If you ignore the large element of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act that was dedicated to cutting taxes, the largest spending element was aid to state and local governments to prevent tax hikes and these kind of spending cuts. In an ideal world, Congress would have appropriated even more funds for these purposes than was in the initial problem. Instead, the Senators from Maine teamed up with some moderate Democrats to scale it back. It’s been a huge mistake and we’re likely to continue paying the price for it in terms of sub-trend output for years to come.

Look, it's not complicated: if you wanna rub one out to the newly single Halle Berry, go to smackthemtitties.com; if you want expert critiquing on macroeconomics, you come to Xmastime. Period.