Congress to pass supplemental stimulus “bailout” to state governments

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

When our Accidental Governor succeeded to office in February 2009, she briefly postured and pontificated against the stimulus bill under consideration in Congress. She and others like Sen. Russell Pearce toyed with the idea of Arizona rejecting any stimulus aid from the federal government.

Once Congress passed the stimulus bill, however, Jan Brewer went with hat in hand to apply for the federal stimulus aid that she had postured and pontificated against. In her campaign for governor, Brewer has the unmitigated gall to claim credit for "creating jobs," i.e, the jobs saved by the federal stimulus aid to the state of Arizona. Brewer is shameless.

Republicans in Congress continued their ideological crusade against federal stimulus aid to state governments labeling it a government "bailout." Perhaps they would prefer to see state governments filing for bankruptcy and defaulting on their obligations while simultaneously destroying the bond market and their state pension funds invested in the stock market? Senate Republicans have been engaged in a filibuster of a supplemental stimulus aid package to state governments for weeks now.

The ironic part is that the Arizona Legislature adopted a budget for FY 2011 that included this supplemental stimulus aid from the federal government in its budget calculations. It was anticipated that this aid would be forthcoming. But Sens. Kyl and McCain have voted to deny this supplemental stimulus aid to Arizona and to simultaneously make Arizona's budget deficit that much worse. Arizona's twin embarrassments are shameless.

The Senate Republican filibuster of the supplemental stimulus aid package to state governments was finally broken on Wednesday when the mythical moderates from Maine, Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, crossed the aisle to vote for cloture with the Democrats. Senate nears OK for $26B in aid to states:

The Senate on Wednesday cleared the last major hurdle to approving a $26 billion aid package for cash-strapped states that is expected to keep 140,000 teachers from being laid off nationwide and sustain medical care for the poor.

Governors from nearly every state had pressed for help in the face of falling revenues and state budgets decimated by the recession and lagging economic recovery. Many states had already counted on the extra federal aid in their spending calculations – raising the possibility of new budget crunches if the measure failed.

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The Senate is scheduled to give its final approval to the bill today. And House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she would call the House, which has already begun its August recess, back into session next week to approve the Senate bill and send it to President Obama for his promised signature.

The aid for the states has been a priority for Obama administration.

The Senate package includes $16 billion for Medicaid, the joint state-federal program to provide health care to low-income Americans. The recession and continuing high unemployment had sent Medicaid costs soaring and created a major problem for many states.

Enhanced Medicaid funding was first made available in the 2009 economic recovery act but is scheduled to expire in December. The Senate bill package would extend aid for six more months through June 2011.

The package also provides $10 billion in education funds, and the National Education Association estimates 138,000 teachers' jobs could be saved.

Thousands of other public workers could have their jobs spared with the extra money flowing to the states, Democrats say.

So we are confronted once again with the questions that existed in February 2009. Will Jan Brewer and extremists like Sen. Russell Pearce rail against the federal stimulus "bailout" to Arizona and posture and pontificate that the state should reject the federal stimulus aid in favor of slash and burn budget cuts that would decimate the state in the interest of ideological purity? Or will our Accidental Governor accept the federal stimulus "bailout" funds with hat in hand and then have the unmitigated gall to claim credit for the jobs saved by this Democratic bill?

If your job has been saved, thank the Democrats.