Fred Barnes is on to something. In fact a few things.
In his piece in The Weekly Standard this week he points out that if Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) isn’t tempted to support the stimulus it’s no wonder it has become a GOP punching bag:
“McCain’s stand is significant in a way no other Republican senator’s would be. He’s not the run-of-the-mill Republican making a partisan point. He’s hardly a Limbaugh dittohead. McCain is the Senate’s most relentless seeker of bipartisan compromise. His colleagues feared he might seek the media’s favor by going along with Obama,” writes Barnes.
But why wasn’t McCain involved AT ALL in stimulus negotiations? He offered his own substitute bill, costing $421 billion and consisting mostly of tax cuts, but did Obama actually blow him off, or was McCain purposefully distant? I would like to know.
Another interesting point Barnes makes is on state aid, a point of contention between the Senate and House. “I talked to state treasurers from Indiana, Nebraska and Mississippi last week. They said their states don’t need the money. But they’re likely to take it: approximately $6 billion for the three states.”
Republicans opposing the stimulus from those three states should have had the nerve to come out and declare on the record that their states didn’t need any aid.
SHOULD MEMBERS OF CONGRESS ADMIT THEIR STATES DON’T NEED AID? Ask A.B. returns Tuesday, Feb. 17. Please join my weekly video Q & A by sending your questions and comments to askab@digital-staging.thehill.com. Thank you.