Spring Break
$3 trillion! Senate, Fed, Treasury attack crisis
Associated Press
Issue date: 2/10/09 Section: News
WASHINGTON (AP) - On a single day filled with staggering sums, the Obama administration, Federal Reserve and Senate attacked the deepening economic crisis Tuesday with actions that could throw as much as $3 trillion more in government and private funds into the fight against frozen credit markets and rising joblessness.
"It's gone deep. It's gotten worse," President Barack Obama said of the recession at a campaign-style appearance in Ft. Myers, Fla., where unemployment has reached double digits. "The situation we face could not be more serious."
If any more emphasis were needed, Wall Street investors sent stocks plunging, objecting that new rescue details from the government were too sparse despite the huge numbers. The Dow Jones industrials dropped 382 points.
The president spoke shortly after Senate passage of an $838 billion emergency economic stimulus bill cleared the way for talks with the House on a final compromise. In a display of urgency, White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel traveled to the Capitol in mid-afternoon for meetings with Democratic leaders as well as moderate senators whose views - and votes - will be key to any compromise.
Separately, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner outlined plans for spending much of the $350 billion in financial bailout money recently cleared by Congress, and the Federal Reserve announced it would commit up to $1 trillion to make loans more widely available to consumers.
Taken together, the events marked at least a political watershed if not an economic turning point - the day the three-week old administration and its congressional allies assumed full control of the struggle against the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
The vote was 61-37 in the Senate to pass the stimulus, with moderate Republican Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania joining Democrats in support.
Even before the vote, Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi met with Obama at the White House to go over the task ahead.
"It's gone deep. It's gotten worse," President Barack Obama said of the recession at a campaign-style appearance in Ft. Myers, Fla., where unemployment has reached double digits. "The situation we face could not be more serious."
If any more emphasis were needed, Wall Street investors sent stocks plunging, objecting that new rescue details from the government were too sparse despite the huge numbers. The Dow Jones industrials dropped 382 points.
The president spoke shortly after Senate passage of an $838 billion emergency economic stimulus bill cleared the way for talks with the House on a final compromise. In a display of urgency, White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel traveled to the Capitol in mid-afternoon for meetings with Democratic leaders as well as moderate senators whose views - and votes - will be key to any compromise.
Separately, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner outlined plans for spending much of the $350 billion in financial bailout money recently cleared by Congress, and the Federal Reserve announced it would commit up to $1 trillion to make loans more widely available to consumers.
Taken together, the events marked at least a political watershed if not an economic turning point - the day the three-week old administration and its congressional allies assumed full control of the struggle against the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
The vote was 61-37 in the Senate to pass the stimulus, with moderate Republican Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania joining Democrats in support.
Even before the vote, Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi met with Obama at the White House to go over the task ahead.
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Slumber time over
posted 2/10/09 @ 6:27 PM MST
Holy crap people. We need to wake up to the world around us. Has any catastrophic event actually occurred or are we just buying into this idea of a depression? Do we really need to spend our grandchildrens grandchildrens money right now?
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