The newly passed "spending bill", er I mean stimulus package...

How can anyone stay quiet on this subject? Where is all the discussion about this new “spending bill” that congress passed this week? This is NOT a discussion about Democrat or Republican – liberal vs conservative; this is a common sense discussion about right and wrong? This is the largest most massive bill EVER passed in these United States. How many congressional leaders even read the bill? This bill is 1,100 pages long and nobody had time to read it all the way through. The American people were promised by this new administration that everyone would be able to read the bill and understand where the money is going. Full transparency is what we were promised and yet, the bill has passed and no one has read it. Where is the outrage? Where is the discussion? Where is our democracy? Never before has any leader been given a pass like this one? OK, so perhaps many people are thinking well if it doesn’t work they will hang themselves with their own rope….But at what cost to all of us?

The issue and the discussion here is NOT about whether this “stimulus” package will work or not – unfortunately we won’t know for a while – so this is not the point of this discussion. The point for me is that this new president promised us transparency and clarity, honesty and openness. So far we have not seen that demonstrated by this administration. Where is the transparency? Where is his leadership to stand up to the fellow democrats who loaded this bill with pork spending? There are 100’s of items in this bill that have nothing to do with stimulus and everything to do with the normal spending that this congress has been so anxious to get to.

I for one am hopeful that I am completely wrong about this bill. I hope somehow it works because we desperately need it to work. But here’s the deal, just like everything else in life – when something is hidden, or accomplished in the dark – then it is probably not something worthy to be illuminated – but rather should be exposed to the light so that all can bear witness to it’s real purpose. Full transparency, full disclosure, letting full light illuminate all the details – isn’t this what we all need to be about?