Why I'm glad John McCain isn't president

During the stimulus debate:

“$50 million in funding for the National Endowment for the Arts — all of us are for the arts,” McCain said. “Tell me how that creates any significant number of jobs? After-school snack program is probably a good idea. Do we really want to spend $726 million on it?”

I have answer for you, John McCain. How about $1 billion in Arts Funding. That would create a lot of jobs. And $50 million won't hurt either. Because all the nonprofit organizations that receive these funds generate economic output. Apparently, all of us aren't for the arts. You might like the arts, but you don't seem to know how they show up in galleries. Or how artists, and arts professionals, make a living. Which is to say, in this country, very rarely.

Thank God he's not President.

I will say, though, that I'm a bit disgusted by what I'm hearing is coming out of the Senate. The Republicans (a minority party that was shamed in the election and hurt the American public for the last eight years) asked for less spending, more tax cuts. They got: less spending, more tax cuts.

Why? Because they threatened filibuster or something? It's almost comforting to know that even if this time of great hope, the Congress can give us a sense of despair.

I want watch Boehner and McConnell actually filibuster. Someone explain the logic of avoiding the threat of filibuster by negotiation. Make them do it. It's like someone saying "I'll hit you" and you give them all your money so they don't. Even though they've never, ever actually hit you.