Dems off base on attacks of Republicans who took stimulus money

While it isn’t a new form of attack, it’s clearly made it to the top of the Democratic talking-points list that members of Congress and Democratic strategists use during their interviews, as the tactic is being used more and more of late.  The strategy is to  call Republicans whose districts received stimulus money hypocrites for voting against the bill and then ‘taking’ stimulus money for use in their districts.

The latest attack is being launched at the Governor of Virgina:

Democrats have targeted Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell in their effort to paint Republicans as hypocritical when it comes to stimulus money.

The Governor’s office confirmed Monday that Virginia will receive $24 million in federal funds over the next four years to use on health care information technology.

That money comes from funds made available to states by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

McDonnell has emerged as  a rising star in the Republican party since his landslide election victory last November.

McDonnell’s office released a statement on Monday heaping praise on the funding, “I thank U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius for approving Virginia’s application for cooperative funding…”

However, during his campaign McDonnell said the stimulus bill would bring dangerous long term debt.

The DNC wasted no time in jumping on the issue.

“The spate of Republicans being exposed for seeking stimulus dollars under the radar, proves that either Republicans were just being sarcastic when they assailed the stimulus and they actually love the Recovery Act, or their objections are based on politics and not principle,” said  Hari Sevugan, DNC spokeswoman.

As always, it’s hard to tell whether Democrats are really so totally confused on the difference between opposing a stimulus bill they believe is bad for the country and their state or district receiving stimulus money once the Democrats passed the bill.

Senators and House Representatives are sent to Washington to represent the best interest of the people in their districts.  Virtually all Republicans opposed the stimulus bill, because they didn’t believe the orgy of spending and the resulting deficit ballooning was good for the voters of their district, state and country.

However, once the Democrats in Congress passed the $850+ billion stimulus bill then Republicans have an obligation to their constituents to request funds for their home states and districts.  Their constituents, along with their children and grandchildren, will be paying for the trillions of dollars of new debt the Democrats are racking up, so therefore Republicans would not be doing their job if they ‘stood on principle’ and refused to take stimulus dollars.  The people of their districts are going to have to pay for this stimulus bill for a very long time, so therefore they must receive an equal share of it.

The reality is that the Democrats making these accusations of hypocrisy know that there is a big difference between Republican opposition of the bill, and those same Republicans now ‘accepting’ or ‘requesting’ funds for their districts.  However, that fact doesn’t matter.  This week has been decreed a “promote the stimulus” week by President Obama.  He has Cabinet members flying around the country for photo ops and to spin how great the stimulus bill has been.  Therefore, by default, the President’s decree also makes this an ‘honest free’ week.