It’s not big news, in that we’ve known for some time that the Obama stimulus plan included money for governments and transit systems to upgrade their fleets to be more energy-efficient and alternative-fuel-oriented, but the administration used Earth Day to release some details about the $300 million addition to the Clean Cities program.
Here is the full text of the news release, after the jump:
More money is trickling down from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, as the Barack Obama White House today announced Florida is getting more than $160 million for greening up the state. Tampa gets $3.7 million; St. Petersburg gets $2.3 million, and other Tampa Bay governments likewise are getting millions.
Here’s the announcement:
WMNF Evening News anchor Mitch Perry and I taped the second PoHo podcast (or “HoCast”) on Monday, a freewheeling discussion of two bummer subjects (the stimulus and job losses) and one fun (IKEA and its scary hold on its fans).
Take a listen and let me know what you think.
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Yes, there was something richly ironic about taping our very “new media” political podcast in what used to be Creative Loafing’s morgue, or where we kept all our newspaper print back issues. I should say, keep, because they are all still in there, some bound in red leather collections.
Ahh, the good old days.
But I love this podcast biz. For my first, I invited WMNF’s Mitch Perry and Democratic consultant Ana Cruz to throw around three of the biggest issues of the week: the economic recovery and whether the Florida Legislature will try to reject some stimulus dollars; Barack Obama’s timetable for withdrawal in Iraq, which has not pleased some on the far left; and Mayor Pam Iorio’s rail-transit dreams running into a bit of a buzzsaw at the Hillsborough County Commission. Plus, we listen to the sound clip of the week. I’ll give you a hint: it is from a well-known prescription drug abuser.
Listen and enjoy, and we’ll have a new one for you every week.
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By Ben Luongo
PoHo contributor
Ben Luongo is a USF political science graduate student. He will be graduating this spring.
The idea of Rush Limbaugh filling the GOP’s power vacuum has dominated the media for the past month. The most obvious example was the TV ad paid by the Americans United for Change (AUFC), which claims that Republican senators are picking up their queues from Limbaugh.
The rationale for this ad, according to Brad Woodhouse, President of AUFC, is that “Limbaugh is the leader of the Republican Party. He says jump and Eric Cantor and other Republican leaders say how high.” To call Limbaugh the leader of the Republican Party is to lose the meaning of the word ‘leader’. He has no political power obviously, but as Fiore and Barabak from the L.A. Times put it, “Rush Limbaugh has his grip on the GOP microphone”.
The important question, however, isn’t how much influence Limbaugh has. His influence is apparent, especially now that CPAC honored him with the “Defender of the Constitution Award”. Assuming that he does have his finger on the conservative pulse, what we should ask is how Limbaugh will affect policies designed with the intention of “change,” and how will American respond to this.
The answer to this lies in the closing speech he gave to CPAC on Saturday.
The Florida Legislature’s annual lawmaking session starts Tuesday, with Gov. Charlie Crist’s State of the State Address that evening. The lawmakers have to fill billions of dollars worth of budget deficit, and Crist’s insistence that federal stimulus money will ease the pain is finding disagreement among the hardcore conservatives who control the House and (to a lesser degree) the Senate.
From the Miami Herald:
The stimulus money leaves Republicans in a difficult position. If they spend the money, they would look as if they’re siding with and acting like Democrats. If they refuse the cash, they would have to make deep budget cuts that would be tough to explain to constituents.
Adding to the tension: Lawmakers will likely forego tens of millions in home-town projects that they are accustomed to bringing back to their districts. Also, the House was thrown into disarray over Rep. Ray Sansom’s connections to a home-town college to which he disproportionately steered money, only to win an unadvertised job there. He faces a criminal investigation and his quit both the college job and his post as House speaker.
Lawmakers will take the federal money, if Crist has anything to do with it. He has publicly advocated for the stimulus money in appearances around the state, with President Barack Obama and on national television. Crist is entertaining a run for the U.S. Senate.
Barack Obama’s commitment to reshape the U.S. transportation system in the stimulus bill has its limits, despite putting aside $8 billion for rail.
Once that money is split up between 11 regions in the U.S., it won’t go very far to create bullet-train high-speed rail that progressives envision.
The Ledger reports:
That money will not be enough to pay for a single bullet train, transportation experts say. And by the time the $8 billion gets divided among the 11 regions across the country that the government has designated as high-speed rail corridors, they say, it is unlikely to do much beyond paying for long-delayed improvements to passenger lines, and making a modest investment in California’s plan for a true bullet train.
In the short term, the money – inserted at the 11th hour by the White House – could put people to work improving tracks, crossings and signal systems.
That could help more trains reach speeds of 90 to 110 miles per hour, which is much faster than they currently go. It is much slower, however, than high-speed trains elsewhere, like the 180 mph of the newest Japanese bullet train. (The Acela trains on the East Coast are capable of 150 mph, but average about half that.)
That includes the I-4 corridor, which is envisioned for a high-speed system shuttling folks between Orlando’s theme parks and Pinellas’ beaches.
From the Miami Herald:
When the Republican governor helps the Democratic president sell his economic stimulus plan tomorrow in Fort Myers, Charlie Crist will put himself at odds with all of the state’s representatives on Capitol Hill. Every House Republican voted against the plan, and Sen. Mel Martinez is also expected to vote no.
Consider Crist’s support in the context of the statement issued Friday by U.S. Rep. Connie Mack, a Republican who represents the Fort Myers area.
“While he is here, we hope the President will take the time to listen to the people’s views on why the Democrats’ stimulus plan won’t stimulate the economy, and why we need pro-growth solutions that will create jobs and jumpstart our economy,” Mack said. “The people of Southwest Florida, and indeed the nation, want to see a plan that will get our economy moving, not a plan that is chock-full of spending for pork and special interests.”
Read the full story here.
An aside: It is especially hilarious to hear Mack call for more unfettered growth, since he represents one of the worst cases of overbuilding and speculation without proper growth management down in Lehigh Acres. The New York Times wrote of the place: “In Lehigh Acres, homes are selling at 80 percent off their peak prices. Only two years after there were more jobs than people to work them, fast-food restaurants are laying people off or closing. Crime is up, school enrollment is down, and one in four residents received food stamps in December, nearly a fourfold increase since 2006.”
But Mack depends on those landowners and developers for his campaign cash, and since he’s mulling a U.S. Senate run, he wants to push his “conservative” credentials against the president’s stimulus plan. Since when did being a conservative equate to being a land-rush huckster?
The two hottest searches on Google today are for Americans for Prosperity and No Stimulus Petition, which links you to the anti-Obama stimulus package movement and an online petition. Evidence enough that Barack Obama faces an uphill battle for the hearts and minds, as his White House has allowed the anti-stimulus package forces to define the legislation and the terms of battle. Classic framing theory, and surprising to see just how rookie the Obama Administration handled it.
One reason is likely that he won’t/can’t stand up publicly to the self-destructive House Democrats. Sure, less than 1 percent of the House bill was really pork. But it was pork that was indefensible, and at a total tab of more than 800 billion, it was pork that individually ran into the tens of millions of dollars.
Out in Real America, that kind of cash is still big money and can’t be p’shawed away so easily. For the past week, my email inbox has been stuffed with pointed, funny and (mostly) successful anti-stimulus propaganda: The Libertarian Party, “America’s third largest party tonight urged Senate Republicans and Democrats to scrap plans their joint plans for a $780 billion package of wealth transfers and expanded government spending;” the National Black Republicans, “The fierce urgency of pork;” and the new House Republican plan website that “details the smarter, simpler stimulus plan proposed by House Republicans that will create twice the jobs at half the price “
(Take a look at this cool WaPo graphic on where the money would be spent if you need help visualizing where it is all going.)
So as Obama preps for his Fort Myers dog-and-pony on Tuesday and a prime-time news conference tonight to try to take back the high ground in his first major legislative battle, here are 10 Talking Points for what he must say and commit to do:
How does $335 million in stimulus package funding create jobs, Madame Speaker? The hemming and hawing and dissembling ensues.
The state hopes to get $3.5 billion in stimulus money earmarked for education, a big help in filling Florida’s budget hole.
But the Orlando Sentinel says not so fast there.
The daily reports that a provision in the economic recovery package calls for the stimulus money to go only to those states that can support “schools for the next two years at the levels they had in the 2005-06 school year.
“But the state is below that threshold,” the paper reports. “In fact, school funding coming directly from the state is now lower than it was in the 2004-05 school year. With Florida’s budget shortfall for next year ballooning toward $4 billion, it’s not clear it could meet that requirement.”
Read the story here.
The karaoke killer? Police say Robert Farley killed his father then returned to a Plant City hotel to dance and sing the night away, caught on hotel video (click here if video doesn’t load on your browser):
Today’s top headlines:
We’re kicking off Thanksgiving week in style with SNL’s “turkeys on the run” skit from over the weekend. Enjoy.
“I don’t see how the inherent dangers of space flight could hurt this business.”
