College dropout and professional loudmouth Rush Limbaugh has proposed his own version of an economic stimulus plan. My favorite part was probably this paragaph:
Keynesian economists believe government spending on "shovel-ready" infrastructure projects -- schools, roads, bridges -- is the best way to stimulate our staggering economy. Supply-side economists make an equally persuasive case that tax cuts are the surest and quickest way to create permanent jobs and cause an economy to rebound. That happened under JFK, Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. We know that when tax rates are cut in a recession, it brings an economy back.
George W. Bush's term ended a little less than two weeks ago, and until Obama gets his stimulus package passed we're living in an economy that's 100% a product of Republican economic policies. So if supply-side economic theory can persuasively be argued to produce permanent jobs, why are businesses shedding jobs by the tens of thousands? Why is the U.S. auto industry on the verge of collapse? Why is the economy teetering on the edge of a global depression?
Now, I think it can be said that if George W. Bush's supply-side economic policies had left the nation with a staggering national debt and a roaring economy there could be something to be said for them. If, on the converse, these policies had managed to significantly shrink the national debt, but left us with an iffy economy there could be something to be said for them. But the fact is that the supply-side policies that were championed and implemented over the last 8 years of the Bush presidency left us with a doubling of the U.S. national debt and an economy that's teetering on the edge of total collapse. That's right, over the course of eight short years, Bush and his GOP cronies added as much debt as all the other presidents in our 227 year history combined and left us nothing but war and economic insecurity to show for it.
Under these circumstances I think it's safe to say that the supply-side economic laissez-fairy tale that Limbaugh is promoting has been pretty conclusively discredited.