Obama's Budget Plan
I like TJIC's analogy for explaining the staggering depths to which the Obama administration is going to look for budget cuts:
Lots of folks are having fun pointing out that Obama's "$100 million budget cut" on a $3.69 trillion budget is pretty small potatoes.
Speaking of small potatoes, here's my analogy:
A Big Mac has 540 calories.
A small McDonalds French Fries has 230. Looking at the picture at the McDonalds website, I could believe that there are maybe 42 fries in there, so call it perhaps 5.4 calories per individual fry.
So, Obama's budget is like saying
"Please give me 370 Big Macs "¦ and one french fry. No, not "a small order of fries." Just a single, lone french fry.
Wait.
Actually, I'm trying to lose weight.Cancel that french fry - I'll just have the 370 Big Macs.
Mesa Econoguy:
If you run the numbers, we’re looking at incremental stimulus of approx. 9.7% GDP, three times larger than any postwar recession stimulus.
Which supports my earlier statement that Obama is a complete and total moron. So are those who voted for him.
April 25, 2009, 10:39 amAllen:
I was thinking of the people you see that get the super sized meal but for the pop they get a diet coke.
April 25, 2009, 9:47 pmLink:
Today, Sunday, Obama's weekly address was on "Fiscal Discipline." You can't make this stuff up.
Here it is complete: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/04/25/obamas_weekly_address_fiscal_discipline_96180.html
As he builds a "new foundation for lasting prosperity" ... "One of the pillars of that foundation must be fiscal discipline." Do we really want a foundation with pillars? We might be better off building on sand.
"... we have identified two trillion dollars in deficit-reductions over the next decade, while taking on the special interest spending that doesn't advance the peoples' interests."
He says he's for PAYGO legislation -- "new tax or entitlement policies should be paid for." ... so -- for the next decade -- does that mean we need $10 trillion in spending cuts, or $10 trillion in new taxes.
He wants to have suggestion boxes for government employees, and to have government use technology like business does.
"We cannot sustain deficits that mortgage our children's future, nor tolerate wasteful inefficiency."
Where's George Orwell when we need him.
April 26, 2009, 7:43 pmHowToWinAtKeno:
I like the reading, good analogy.
April 27, 2009, 5:25 amInsaneDeuces:
It's a shame... I hope everybody comment in this way on his blog.
April 27, 2009, 6:03 amJerseyCash5:
I think Obama is doing things right.
April 27, 2009, 6:43 ammorganovich:
another way to look at it would be:
$3.69 trillion dollars per year of spending is $117 million per second.
so these proposed cuts constitute less than 1 second per year in which we cut back. clearly this cannto be intended to have any actual fiscal effect. it's just a PR stunt.
April 27, 2009, 8:49 amoffroad:
I think your math is bad morganovich:
3,690,000,000,000/365/24/60 = 7,020,548
April 27, 2009, 9:38 ammorganovich:
yes, you are correct. it's $117,000/second so $100 million is about 14 minutes of spending. must have failed to cancel some zeros.
April 27, 2009, 10:58 amfeeblemind:
Your Big Mac analogy might make a good political ad, only I would have him order 15,540 Big Macs and one order of fries. Then when he sees the bill he cancels the fries to save mony.
April 27, 2009, 1:04 pm