Obama: My Economic Stimulus Bill Will Make Caterpillar Re-Hire Laid Off Workers

• February 12, 2009

The One is cocksure about it, but Caterpillar itself is a bit more circumspect:

SPRINGFIELD, Va. – President Barack Obama, campaigning to cast his economic plan in terms of real jobs and families, said Wednesday that machinery giant Caterpillar Inc. plans to rehire some of its laid-off workers if Congress approves a sweeping stimulus bill.
The president sought to offer a clear example of how the legislation would help as House and Senate negotiators reached for a final deal with the White House, trimming the emerging legislation down to below $800 billion. That’s still an enormous package, targeted at an economy that continues to bleed jobs.

Buried further down in the article, well after Obama’s assurances about the re-hiring:

Caterpillar spokesman Jim Dugan said that he had no comment on the president’s account of the company’s plans but did not dispute it either. He said the company did not want to discuss ahead of time what its chairman would say during the president’s visit, but that it looked forward to hosting Obama.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said that Caterpillar “did communicate to the White House” that it plans to reevaluate its employment situation, particularly in Peoria and downstate Illinois, based on “a big investment that could be coming shortly to put Americans back to work.”

I’m not really sure why this is at all illustrative of the good Obama alleges the “economic stimulus” spending spree would do. Caterpillar saying they might hire back some laid off workers in exchange to a big, steaming government handout?
Sounds like rent-seeking to me, not stimulus.
And how sustainable is this kind of “stimulus” even if you think it would work? What happens when Caterpillar’s handout runs out? Do they lay these people off again? How is Obama’s stimulus going to generate enough on-going business for Caterpillar to justify hiring back even a significant portion of the people that have been laid off?
It’s not going to do any such thing, which is the problem. Obama’s making the claim, and Caterpillar isn’t going to make him look like a fool (especially not when it might put some “stimulus” handout money at risk), so the American public is going to get duped.
Hope ‘n change!

Tags: Asshats, Domestic Issues, Politics

http://ipadtouch.blogspot.com/ byajero

This could be a good news not only to the United States but to the whole world where people are really watching and following what Obama can do with the falling economy.

by: Hectic Capiznon Bloggers 2009
http://sayanythingblog.com/entry/america_is_back/#c397018 DINO

A successful economic stimulus program only works when the free market is given a jump start. When the producer or the consumer is given a temporary incentive, Then the free market is allowed to do what it does best – it allows market forces to determine economic value and reality.

The free market fails all the time. It has failed us now. Time to try something new.
http://boyddrivefollies.blogspot.com/ Good Ol Boy

So if Chocolate Jesus drops a few hunnert million into infrastrucure, Cat MAY see a bump in equipment sales and leasing. I say BFD, and I bet under their breath, the execs at Cat say the same thing. Cat has been forced to give up completely on sales of on-highway diesel engines for the foreseeable future. They looked at what it would take to make a diesel produce 600 horsepower AND spew bouquets of flowers into the air and said fuck it. The cost of EPA compliance for 2010 engines will add ten to fifteen thousand dollars to the price of every new truck built. Cat looked at this, saw the writing on the wall, and they wanted no part of it. And once you’re out, its damn tough to get back in.
More liberal nonsense that gains so very little and costs so very much. Chocolate Jesus is the personification of all that liberals hold near and dear. You poor stupid sonsabitches.
robert108

The free market fails all the time. It has failed us now.

Dumb little dinostem keeps squealing the same lie, over and over again, and keeps getting smacked with the truth: the rigging of a once-free market by the Dem social engineers failed once again; it didn’t accomplish any social goals, and just screwed up a market that was working perfectly well before the Dems rigged it.
It’s always Dem social engineering and wasteful social spending that messes things up; always.
http://sayanythingblog.com/readers/author/realitybasedbob/ realitybasedbob

Hey rube,

Buried further down in the article, well after Obama’s assurances about the re-hiring:

????

You do know the paragraph you used was the [size=6][color=red]VERY NEXT PARAGRAPH [/color][/size] following the quote from Obama, doncha?

Here, rube lemme show it to ya:

Said Obama: “Today, the chairman and CEO of Caterpillar said that if the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan passes, his company would be able to rehire some of those employees.” He did not specify to whom the company chairman and CEO, Jim Owens, made such a pledge.

Caterpillar spokesman Jim Dugan said he had no comment on the president’s account of the company’s plans but did not dispute it either. He said the company did not want to discuss ahead of time what its chairman would say during the president’s visit, but that it looked forward to hosting Obama.

Nutters…..
Mickey

Almost everything about the Obama stimulus package will make things worse because almost everything about this package defies both common sense and free market principles.

A successful economic stimulus program only works when the free market is given a jump start. When the producer or the consumer is given a temporary incentive, Then the free market is allowed to do what it does best – it allows market forces to determine economic value and reality.

In fact, the Obama economic stimulus package is illusory. When both sides of a market are artificially inflated, the market will collapse when free market forces come into play.

The administration insists that spending incurs growth. In truth, spending incurs debt. The absolute worst thing for an individual to do in tough times is to spend money or incur debt at the expense of saving. The political establishment understands these truths. That is why retirements funds, education funds and mortgage deductions exist. There can be no healthy economy if there is no incentive to save money. Whether the Obama administration cares to admit it or not, tax cuts encourage both spending and saving.

Obama is wrong and we are so screwed.
erick1740

This crap was tried back in the 30′s, all it caused was more misery.
Alice Cialis

….and Betty Crocker announced today that eating her lemon cake will result in a better sex life.
robert108

Woof: Your bullshit is irrelevant, as usual. The term “free market” refers to freedom of entry and exit to and from the market, respectively, and has nothing to do with the political process, unless politicians rig a market to obtain a social/political outcome. Educate yourself.
bill-tb

Do we get a timeline with that patronage package for the economic recovery?

We know the joke, this whole porkulus is nothing more that Chicago style patronage payoffs for the dumb Democrats who support this commie. But it won’t work. As commies in the past have found, and now Venezuela is learning, the money runs out. Even the failed President FDR finally figured it out after turning a recession into a decades long depression.

Why work if the pies are free. All the election of 2008 did was validate the known communist theory, you can make idiot voters out of ignorant people by promising them lots of free stuff. And the Democrat party is full of ignorants, the embarrassing Obama townhall Operah wanna be shows of this week, proved that.
sayanything-2483

The free market fails all the time. It has failed us now. Time to try something new.
DINO on February 11, 2009 at 08:40 pm

Going deeper into a hole doesn’t make sense.
WOOFX

Has everything to do with the political process.

“free market” refers to freedom of entry and exit to and from the market, respectively, and has nothing to do with the political process,

Baseball stadium, ethanol plant,highway entrance, zoning problem?
There is no free market.
WOOFX

There is no free market.
Not under Republicans or Dems.
Costs money to get elected and
business pays both parties.
Tom Gorton

I could've sworn that Obama said he owned the economy if he got his stimulus package got passed. Anybody have that quote?

SayAnythingBlog.com

Obama: My Economic Stimulus Bill Will Make Caterpillar Re-Hire Laid Off Workers

Create a SAB Readerblog

Recent Comments