As an aid to everyone who's taken an Econ 101 textbook off the shelf in an attempt to better understand the various competing economic stimulus proposals, here's a chart from a July 2008 report by Mark Zandi:
Of course, Republicans failed to push through their tax-cuts-only amendment, even though permanent tax cuts are among the least effective stimulus measures...talk about being blinded by ideology. (Fortunately, they're no longer in control.)
Republicans only seem to care about sensible fiscal policy when they're opposing Democratic spending--even though spending is more effective than the GOP's one-solution-for-every-problem tax cuts. (See their vocal support for Bush's budget-busting tax cuts--which were almost twice as expensive as Obama's stimulus package--here and here. And don't even get me started on the $3 trillion cost of Bush's Iraq misadventure; that's a millstone that will be hanging around all our necks of the rest of our lives.)
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