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DEL.ICIO.USIsakson on stimulus: ‘I didn’t trade my vote’
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Even though the Senate unanimously approved his $15,000 tax credit for homebuyers, U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson said he will wait until he sees the final bill before deciding whether to vote for it.
“I didn’t trade my vote for the amendment,” he told my AJC colleague Thomas Oliver this afternoon.
Republicans led by Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, considered a moderate, are attempting to pare down the House-passed stimulus bill. She has said her aim is $700 billion or less, well below the $819 billion House version — and even further below the $900 billion now in a Senate version pumped up with amendments. Now, including Isakson’s.
The Georgia senator said Collins is talking about eliminating the spending provisions that have little to do with job creation, like the millions for smoking cessation programs and community swimming pools.
Isakson said he felt his amendment would make the final cut. Collins, the one leading the effort to slash the stimulus package, voted for it, he said.
Photo credit: AFP/Getty Images
Comments
By Elsie
February 9, 2009 2:20 PM | Link to this
There are more than 750 pages in this bill. I cannot believe that a single person in Congress except possibly the writers( which includes Pelosi) knows what is in that bill. In the South we call that a pig in a poke. It is not a stimulus bill, it is a spending bill. Government can’t spend our money more wisely than we can. Despite Obama’s continuing campaign rhetoric, Congress needs to barbecue this hog of a bill
By Raging Mod
February 12, 2009 12:33 PM | Link to this
No one read the Patriot Act either - but I didn’t hear any complaints about that except from Michael Moore.
I’ll take my economic advice from ECONOMIST - not Rush Limbaugh or Isakson.
By Raging Mod
February 12, 2009 12:34 PM | Link to this
No one read the Patriot Act either - but I didn’t hear any complaints about that except from Michael Moore.
I’ll take my economic advice from ECONOMIST - not Rush Limbaugh or Isakson.
By Sir Winston
February 12, 2009 2:57 PM | Link to this
Raging Mod, are those the same ECONOMISTS that are surprised about everything every quarter. You know like how every AP article or cable news show that deals with the economy must contain the sentence, “confounding the predictions of economist, the economy did….” To read coverage of ECONOMISTS and their track records leaves one wondering why don’t we fire the ‘Experts” and hire new ones that are right from time to time. I am sure that “Tim the tax man Gietner’ was all over the goings-on on Wall Streey whilst he was head of the NY FED. No reason to worry right, bud? Peace.