Obama Expected to Drop Business Tax Credit

By GottaLaff

He listens. He responds:

On the stimulus, as a show of good faith as negotiations unfold, Obama is expected to drop his least popular proposal, a $3,000 tax credit for companies to create new jobs. Many Democrats have criticized the incentive, touted by Obama on the campaign trail, as ripe for abuse and of dubious merit.

"We've always said we're open to other ideas. This was never set in stone," said a senior Obama adviser of the tax proposal and Obama's stimulus proposals in general.

When Little Georgie Bush used to say he "listened", he really meant he would sit impatiently with his blankie and rock back and forth sucking his thumb, drooling, and dozing off during important meetings.

When P.E. Obama listens, he mulls, he evaluates, he analyzes, he uses his powers of forethought, and then he responds. All without a blankie.

UPDATE: Krugman's ideas. He's a good person for Obama to be listening to.

Last week President-elect Barack Obama was asked to respond to critics who say that his stimulus plan won’t do enough to help the economy. Mr. Obama answered that he wants to hear ideas about “how to spend money efficiently and effectively to jump-start the economy.”

O.K., I’ll bite — although as I’ll explain shortly, the “jump-start” metaphor is part of the problem.

First, Mr. Obama should scrap his proposal for $150 billion in business tax cuts, which would do little to help the economy. Ideally he’d scrap the proposed $150 billion payroll tax cut as well, though I’m aware that it was a campaign promise.

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