Palin in 2012, Rush Limbaugh's Stimulus Plan

In China, the owners of the plant that produced tainted milk protein powder that was responsible for the deaths of six children were sentenced to death. In America, the Georgia owners of the peanut processing plant that is responsible for the deaths of eight people from salmonella may get a fine and a slap on the wrist. Worse, records show that the plant shipped out peanut paste even after it knew about the salmonella taint. Perhaps we should move this case to a Chinese court...

Sarah Palin in the news! A Conneticut group formed a committee to draft Sarah as a Presidential candidate in 2012, and registered with the Federal Elections Committee. Once you are in the database, it seems that no amount of clicking on your file will delete it, and so Ms Palin is listed as a candidate for President in 2012... In response, Sarah has formed her own exploratory committee to see if her candidacy is viable, Sarapac.

Sarah also had dinner with Barack Obama, and even issued a self serving compliment:
"I applaud President Obama's focus on alternative and renewable energy," Palin writes, "and here in Alaska we've joined the effort: I have asked Alaskans to focus on obtaining 50% of our electric generation from renewables by 2025. In the meantime, we must not abandon oil and gas explora

tion and development. In fact, Americans should demand the cooperation of the major oil producers so that Alaska's vast supply of clean natural gas can be brought to market. Alaska stands ready to positively contribute to the nation's markets and energy needs." It looks like the contract to ship Alaska"s natural gas to Canada has fallen through, and she is drumming up support for a pipeline to somewhere in the USA...

In Davros, Switzerland, is a yearly economic summit meeting that focuses on the global situation, and is the rock festival for economists and world policy wonks. Both leaders of Russia and China were critical of how the US has dealt with the meltdown. The Wall Street Journal reports: "The Russian leader mocked U.S. businessmen who he said had boasted at last year's Davos meeting of the U.S. economy's fundamental strength and "cloudless" prospects. "Today, investment banks, the pride of Wall Street, have virtually ceased to exist," he said...

While Mr. Wen never named the U.S., his critique of its failings was as sweeping as Mr. Putin's. The financial crisis, he said, was "attributable to inappropriate macroeconomic policies of some economies and their unsustainable model of development characterized by prolonged low savings and high consumption; excessive expansion of financial institutions in blind pursuit of profit" -- and other excesses." Also, the head of Dell Computers, Michael Dell, offered Mr Putin help in solving its IT problems, hoping for a nice, fat contract. Mr Putin replied, no thanks, the trick is, that we don't have an IT problem...

The GOP leadership is now in retreat for the next few days, so any more wrangling over the stimulus bill will have to wait until Monday. This gives free reign for the Democrats to talk trash about them through the weekend. The new Republican talking head, Rush Limbaugh, has published his version of what the stimulus should be:

"So let's look at how the vote came out, shall we? Fifty-three percent of voters in this country -- we'll say, for the sake of this proposal, 53 percent of Americans -- voted for Obama. Forty-six percent voted for Senator McCain, and 1 percent voted for wackos. Let's give the remaining 1 percent to President Obama, so let's say that 54 percent voted for President Obama and 46 percent voted for Senator McCain. 

"As a way to bring the country together and at the same time determine the most effective way to deal with recessions, under the Obama-Limbaugh Stimulus Plan of 2009, $540 billion of the one trillion will be spent on infrastructure as defined by President Obama and the Democrats. The remaining $460 billion, or 46% that voted for Senator McCain, will be directed towards tax cuts, as determined by me," Limbaugh said. He added that he would cut the capital gains and corporate tax rates.

"So Obama gets $540 billion to spend his way. The other people of this country who did not vote for his way get $460 billion spent the way they would like it spent. This is bipartisanship! This is how bipartisanship really works," Limbaugh said.

Limbaugh says businesses need tax cuts to hire people; and he says reducing or eliminating the capital gains tax would encourage investment. "And once Wall Street starts ticking up 500 points a day, you watch what happens to the rest of the private sector."

If you want to use the American economy as guinea pigs in a lab experiment, this is a nice idea. The current bill already has about 40% tax cuts, so Rush is just blowing hot air. Also, the supply side marketing philosophy has just proven that its ideas are insane and created this mess we are in right now. So he's not coming up with anything new or creative, just retreading stale ideas. Yes, tax incentives are nice, but they won't take effect until this time next year. If my company is about to go out of business now and I have to lay off all of my workers and close my plant now, I need something that will save me right now and carry me over until that tax break next year. And it won't hire back any of the hundreds of thousands who currently have lost their jobs...

Also, I don't think people will be investing with Wall Street firms anytime soon. I wouldn't trust my money with any firm that gave out a huge bonus or run by a Bernie Madoff or long time CIA operative John Thain. Mr Thain's history goes back to the 1960's setting up dummy investment companies for the CIA, along with his friend, George HW Bush...

Because ask.com is erratic in publishing each day's jokes, I offer some older economic ones that hold up well:

"The federal government announced today that the recession ended back in November of 2001. It ended two years ago! Be sure to pass that on to all your unemployed friends. So you know what that means? The past twenty months of job layoffs, corporate bankruptcies and declining stocks, those were the good times. We should have been living it up." —Jay Leno

"Yesterday Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said he would be willing to serve another term. Greenspan said, 'Where else would I get a job in this economy?'" —Conan O'Brien

"Democrats were quick to point out that President Bush's budget creates a 1 trillion dollar deficit. The White House quickly responded with 'Hey, look over there, it's Saddam Hussein.'" —Craig Kilborn

"President Bush unveiled his new economic stimulus plan this week. It was reported that if the plan passes, the president himself would save $44,000 in taxes, Dick Cheney would save $327,000, and you could afford to take the whole family down to Burger King to pick up job applications." —Tina Fey, on Saturday Night Live's "Weekend Update"

"President Bush's economic plan will create 2.5 million new jobs. The bad news, they are all for Iraqi soldiers." —Craig Kilborn

"According to a new study, bad economic times can actually be good for you because people tend to exercise more and eat better. This is not a recession, this is the Bush Health Care Plan." —Jay Leno