Sen. Judd Gregg provides 76 seconds of sanity

"...and they know [these budget numbers] are not sustainable."

Senator Gregg is the ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, and was President Obama's nominee for Commerce Secretary, before withdrawing his name from consideration.



h/t Webutante

John Heilemann in Obama-friendly NYMag.com:

...the administration was comically clueless about [private sector concerns]. When I was at the White House recently, I jokingly asked a senior Obama official if the team was having fun turning the country into a socialist state. “What are you talking about?” this official replied. “Business loves what we’re doing!”

Back in New York the following day, I related that story to a CEO pal of mine who is a big Obama backer. “What are they, smoking crack down there?” he replied. “Find me one CEO who likes what they’re doing. Seriously, find me one!”
[...]
If the stimulus provokes concern in the private sector, the budget causes nothing short of a total freak-out. The size of it ($3.6 trillion in fiscal year 2010) and the oceans of red ink it threatens to unleash give deficit hawks the heebie-jeebies. The redistributionist tilt it brings to the tax code wigs out the wealthy, the modestly wealthy, and the wannabe wealthy. The oxen it gores (e.g., agricultural subsidies) offend entrenched industrial wards of the state.

Beyond those particulars, the sheer ambition and audacity of the thing—health-care reform, cap-and-trade, and much more—raises suspicions that the Obamans are attempting to capitalize on the crisis instead of solving it.

h/t