AFL-CIO President Trumka Warns Obama: Spending Freeze Could Mean Lost Decade

[Better Believe It]

Trumka Warns Obama: Spending Freeze Could Mean Lost Decade
by Sam Stein
January 27, 2010

One of the country's top union leaders warned on Tuesday that President Obama's proposal for a three-year cap on discretionary, non-military spending could ensure a prolonged U.S. recession similar to Japan's "lost decade" in the 1990s.

Richard Trumka, president of the union conglomerate AFL-CIO, raised deep concerns about the president's pledge for a spending freeze during a sit-down interview with the Huffington Post

"We question why they're doing it at a time when we need to be investing more into the economy," Trumka said. "Why are we taking the position that we're going to freeze what we could do? I mean, the president himself, at the last State of the Union message, said that we need to invest in our future. And if that stops him from investing in our future I think it is not a good thing. We question why to do it now."

"I don't want anything to get in the way of creating a jobs bill of the size necessary to solve the problem," Trumka added. "I don't want to get into the Japan syndrome -- a little bit, stop, a little bit, stop, a little bit, stop... and we end up ten years later saying 'Where'd that decade go to?'"

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/27/trumka-warns-obama-spendi_n_438588.html

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Senator Brown Hits Back On White House Spending Freeze
Brian Beutler | January 26, 2010

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) isn't mincing words about the White House's push to freeze domestic discretionary spending. The Ohio progressive took direct aim today at the idea and its supporters, who he suggested are largely the reason the country faces such major fiscal imbalances in the first place.

"I don't think much of it," Brown told reporters.

Start with this: The people who have been most outspoken about debt are the people most responsible for it.... The people, as I said, who have been most outspoken against the budget deficit have been those that voted for the Iraq war, and charged it to our kids, those who voted for the giveaway to the drug and insurance industry in 2003 and charged it to our kids, and those who voted who tax cuts for the rich and charged it to our kids, and those who ignored infrastructure needs in this country for a decade and charged that to our kids. And they come and they're screaming the loudest about the balanced budget. And that disturbs me.

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/01/brown-hits-back-on-white-house-spending-freeze-push.php

[Winterblues]

1. WOW Brown doesn't talk like a Republican

What he said sounds exactly like it came form a Democrat or at the very least a Liberal....Placing blame squarely where it belongs...

[Winterblues]

2. Kick....... more people should hear what he says.

:kick:

[Brickbat]

4. Um....because he's not.

Sherrod Brown is the Democratic senator from Ohio.

[dajoki]

3. K&R