House Dems Strip Stimulus of $200 Million Provision to Refurbish National Mall

What is going on in our government is the same thing that Madoff did to his investors. They take in our money and spend it on whatever they desire, then they send us a little of OUR money back and we're supposed to say, "Oh, thank you, thank you!!" Anybody who is satisfied with that isn't thinking rationally.

Matt - "The Dems seem willing to compromise and cave to Obama's demands to please the Republicans" Well it's easy to compromise when most of it shouldn't have been in the bill in the first place. All the Republicans want is for the bill to do what it is supposed to do - stimulate the economy. Increasing PELL grants & students loans does not create jobs - those increases need to be handled separately. Millions of dollars to study universal health care doesn't create jobs. Millions of dollars for after school snacks does not create jobs. Should I go on?

The Mall is disgraceful! How about $8 for a recycling bin on it? Or just astroturf the whole darn thing.

Republicans complaining about spending and deficits . . . that's funny

"$200 million" is about half what we spend in Iraq per DAY ($10 billion/month)!

The borrow and spend GOP has been running up deficits since the Reagan years. They like to show they are not big spenders by making a big deal out of same single expenditure, like this. Remember all of the talk about the National Endowment for the Arts. Another drop in the bucket compared to what is being spent on some useless program like Star Wars!

Gimme a break.

That's very reassuring that this stimulus package is going somewhere for now. Don't get me wrong, I love this country, but I don't live in the DC area. I want to see something personaly out of that stimulus package. The last one, I wasn't too lucky. IRS got their hands on it. This one I hope to see something out of anything they send.

Come visit America's Capital City - The Mall is our National Mudhole

It concerns me that out nation's Capital City remains a national disgrace - the Jefferson Memorial is falling into the Tidal Basin, the Mall has no grass and is now a massive mudhole - mighty inviting for tourists. Guess their money doesn't count. After busting the budget during their too many years in power and leaving the economy in a shambles, I'm having a hard time understanding why anyone listens to Republicans right now - give the Democrats a chance to do something different - too the neglect of our nation's Capital City will continue thanks to a bunch of hypocritical whiners.

There seems to be some compromise building here to get this thing passed.

Obama/Dems are only cutting out the wasteful spending because they were caught by the GOP and American public who are more watchful over how their money gets spent nowadays. Yes, these projects would have created jobs, but what kind of jobs and to who? Surely not sustainable, long-term positions to those who need employment the most. More of the same political games from a new administration touting change.

"What a shame that the parsimonious GOP has so little appreciation for a national treasure."

What a shame that you are so profligate with someone elses money.

Greg: its 200M, not 20M, so the numbers are even worse

For the National Mall to become and family planning to become part of the stimulus plan really takes away from the seriousness of an intent to create "4 million good paying jobs" with this package.Furthermore,I'm wondering if all the stimulus plan can create is menial jobs.Are those with higher education supposed to rollup their sleeves and transform into handymen? I hope all of this does not end up being hype.

$20,000,000 for sod and seed for the National Mall. Say half is for sod and half is for seed, that comes to $500 per pound of seed and $3,333 per yard of sod - installed.

"Corporations should only make enough profit so they can barely exist."

Scary quote. Where will the new jobs come from if this is your belief? What about entertainers and athletes. Should they just make enough so they can barely exist? What about authors and lawyers and... politicians?

Now, let's get rid of the $4.19 billion for "neighborhood stabilization activities." That means groups like ACORN would be eligible for a portion of the funds.

When is the FEC going to launch an investigation into voter and campaign fraud?

The rise of the Internet as a campaign funding tool raises new questions about the adequacy of FEC requirements on disclosure. In pre-Internet fundraising, almost all political donations, even small ones, were made by bank check, leaving a paper trail and limiting the amount of fraud. Credit cards used to make donations on the Internet have allowed for far more abuse.

The FEC has compiled a separate database of potentially questionable overseas donations that contains more than 11,500 contributions totaling $3.38 million. More than 1,400 of the overseas entries clearly were U.S. diplomats or military personnel, who gave an APO address overseas. Their total contributions came to just $201,680. So, where did the rest come from?

What a shame that the parsimonious GOP has so little appreciation for a national treasure. They're playing gotcha on the bill with a very selective interpretation of what a stimulus is.

What a shame that the parsimonious GOP has so little appreciation for a national treasure. They're playing gotcha on the bill with a very selective interpretation of what a stimulus is.

What doesn't Obama give the money to the people who need it the most. The American people are the ones suffering, so use your heads about this. My idea is to give every household $100,000.00. that way we could: buy a house or the bank off so it won't be foreclosed on, buy a car (or 2) instead of trying the fix the old ones, pay the back taxes on our house or pay the mortgage off, or buy new furniture, appliances, whatever. The purpose of this is that we will be BUYING things. The American people are the ones that will boost the economy but we need money to do it. This stimulus package is only a smoke screen of what is to come. Please President Obama and the GOP, consider my idea.....

"I used to support Obama as well, and now I'm support him even more!

Brilliant moves and all in the course of one week. "

Then you will support him even more when the Republicans force even more pork out of this bill!

Obama is playing this smart and in doing so is beating the repubs at their own game. He's taking out "throw away" parts of the bill that repubs are vociferously objecting to. In doing so Obama gets to claim he's being bi-partisan, and in the end he's going to get the important parts of the package that he really wants anyway. In light of Obama's (and the House Dems') "concessions" to the repubs, the more the repubs continue to reject the package the more they will be viewed as obstructionists who are playing the same old partisan politics. Haha! I love it! Way to go Mr President!

I guess it's okay to give money away in tax rebates, but as soon as you start putting people to work on projects with public value, the slime balls complain.

The National Mall is a disgrace, with parts of the seawall by the Jefferson Memorial falling into the tidepool, potholes and broken curbing throughout, disintegrating concrete and areas where no vegetation can root due to erosion and trampling.
The lighting is poor, too.