Great column by Lowry

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MWQ4NzRlZTU1NWE1ZWEwZTQ3MGU3YzU4ZDRmZTk1MmI=

When Maynard Met Nancy
How to use a crisis to bypass the normal budgetary process.

By Rich Lowry

Nancy Pelosi doesn’t, in Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel’s words, want to “waste a crisis.” She has concocted a hideous stimulus brew brimming with eye of newt, toe of frog, and every other exotic ingredient favored by her Democratic colleagues.....

...According to the Congressional Budget Office, only $4 billion out of $30 billion in highway spending, $3 billion of $18.5 billion in renewable-energy spending, and less than $7 billion of $14 billion of school-construction spending would be spent in the first two years. If spending will take place in 2011 or later, there’s no reason for it to be jammed into a hastily passed stimulus bill.

Unless, of course, Democrats want to use the crisis atmosphere to bypass the normal budgetary process for long-term spending. Almost $16 billion for Pell Grants for college students and $1.9 billion for basic scientific research won’t stimulate the economy in the near term. Neither will funding for the National Endowment for the Arts ($50 million) or for the National Mall ($200 million).

.....Nearly immediate, a payroll tax cut would be felt now, at what is likely the nadir of the recession. A halving of the payroll rate would funnel $400 billion to individuals and businesses, for a total of $800 billion. The cut could be indefinite, to be rolled back when the economy picks up again, or made permanent and replaced by something else (say, an increased gas tax). The payroll tax funds Social Security and Medicare, but those programs can subsist on borrowing for now—like the rest of the federal government.