Republicans Should Call for a Stimulus Reset

The Dems seem to like the image of the "Reset Button." Let's use it on them. Nearly 2/3 of the $800B+ Stimulus Bill passed last year has yet to be spent. Clearly, the Stimulus Bill hasn't worked. It hasn't produced any private sector jobs. It has mainly fended off state and local public employee layoffs that might have occurred due to state and local government budget crises.

Now the Dems want to double-down on stimulus. They are being careful to call it "jobs" vs "stimulus" because they know the word stimulus has become discredited. But why should net new funds be spent on a "jobs bill?" Let's hit the reset button on the stimulus bill, claw back the unspent funds (which if they haven't been spent by now can hardly be expected to be stimulating anything), and use them to fund real stimulus, i.e. meaningful and permanent tax cuts. For example, making the Bush tax cuts permanent and more.

The case that the unspent billions are not stimulative, and merely represent shameless and unprecedented pork barrel spending, is easily made. And in the current climate of voter sensitivity to runaway spending, such a case would be most compelling.

In one fell swoop, the conservatives could reverse hundreds of billions of wasteful spending and the associated debt hangover, and find a source to fund the tax cuts we need to truly get the economy back on its feet again.