Bobby Jindal, Louisiana’s governor, was presented as the Republican party’s answer to Barack Obama on Tuesday night, giving the response to the president’s speech to the joint session of Congress. Jindal’s widely-panned speech sought to portray government as the problem, and he even invoked the Bush administration’s response to Hurricane Katrina as a case for less federal involvement.
Jindal’s speech came on the heels of his public disparagement of the economic stimulus plan recently passed by Congress, and his promise to reject some of the stimulus money aimed at his state.
Jindal, Mark Sanford of South Carolina, and Haley Barbour of Mississippi decried what they called “wasteful” spending. Jindal said on NBC’s Meet the Press that he was turning down $100 million in money that would go to unemployment benefits, because it would require Louisiana to change its unemployment benefits permanently.
Other governors, even prominent Republicans, were more than happy to take the money. Arnold Schwarzenegger, on ABC’s This Week, said, “We are elected to be public servants. So what does it matter if you’re a Democrat or a Republican? When people need to have roads built, when we talk about infrastructure in America, we need $1.7 trillion to $2 trillion of infrastructure in America. Who cares if you’re a Republican or Democrat?”
Infrastructure spending is the backbone of the stimulus bill, which includes $98.3 billion in funding for transportation and other building projects. $2 billion of that is headed for the Army Corps of Engineers, with an additional $375 million just for the Mississippi river and its tributaries. The Corps are the ones responsible for maintaining the levees around New Orleans that failed so dramatically during Hurricane Katrina. Also designated for Louisiana is $73.5 million for public housing, which could go to rebuilding homes destroyed by the storm or torn down in its aftermath.
Other projects funded by the stimulus bill are high-speed rail ($8 billion), broadband technology ($4.6 billion) and modernization of the electricity grid ($4.4 billion). In addition, according to recovery.gov, the largest part of the stimulus bill is tax relief–$288 billion, which should be enough to keep Republicans happy. But, of course, it isn’t.
The largest portion of those tax cuts goes to a “Making Work Pay” tax credit, up to $400 per individual or $800 per married couple, for a total of $116 billion. Other tax cuts go toward extending the patch on the Alternative Minimum Tax, $6.1 billion in business tax incentives, and nearly $20 billion in renewable energy tax credits.
Several states already have plans for the stimulus money—New York, among others, already has its own Web site dedicated to explaining the effects of the law, and claims to already be creating 1,100 jobs with the money as of February 23. Michigan announced that it will receive an additional $260 million from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the state has already applied for its first grant through its Department of Natural Resources. According to CQ Politics, Iowa has already awarded $56.6 million in contracts for infrastructure projects.
Schwarzenegger’s California stands to gain $843.9 million in funding for unemployment benefits because he is willing to abide by the provisions in the stimulus, as is Jennifer Granholm of Michigan, and most other governors outside of Sanford, Barbour and Jindal. The provisions would not only provide for a $25-a-week
increase in benefits to those already receiving them, but also add federal funds to extend benefits to those who had already received all possible state support, and finally widen the pool of people eligible for unemployment.
By rejecting the last two provisions, Jindal is denying unemployment benefits to nearly 25,000 citizens of his state, as projected by the National Employment Law Project. He’s also incorrect that he would be forced to raise taxes on businesses in order to maintain the benefits after the federal money runs out.
Jindal’s fact-stretching continued with his claims in his speech that the stimulus bill was funding a high-speed train from Las Vegas to Los Angeles—not true, money budgeted for high-speed rail has not been allocated yet—and will be allocated by Republican Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. He also disparaged “volcano monitoring,” download Old School movie which coupled with other U.S. Geological Survey facilities and equipment, was a rather small area of the stimulus bill at $140 million.
Jindal will be accepting 98% of the federal stimulus dollars earmarked for his state, so his stand on the unemployment benefits looks far less like a principled stand against government spending and far more like political posturing for a rumored 2012 presidential run.
The only reason, that I can think of, why Jindal, Barbour, and Sanford are repeating Reaganesque propaganda, is that the GOP is fearful of losing its dwindling “base” which still pays lip service to upper-income tax cuts and so-called small government. Outside this shrinking base, which is motivated by white racial anxiety to vote Republican, all other voters have left the GOP. The GOP thinks this base still responds unthinkingly to propaganda from the Reagan years as a pretext for voting against a political party that includes all races. This latest propaganda salvo from the GOP is one more reminder to the GOP “base” that there can also be a fiscal pretext or cover for voting on the basis of white racial anxiety. That’s how I see it, anyway.
Excellent column.
LOL, Jindal as a presidential contender? Why don’t we elect Beaver Cleaver? Republicans don’t know this yet, but they’re going to be nominating Ron Paul. Paul against Obama, now there will be a true ideological debate for the presidency.