Nelson Collins Amendment To Stimulus Gets Vote Tuesday

Senators Ben Nelson (D-NE) and Susan Collins (R-ME) have reached a compromise on a stimulus bill that will be voted on Tuesday. A procedural vote on the measure, known as the Nelson-Collins amendment, is scheduled for Monday evening.

The deal cuts about $100 billion from the economic stimulus package. Education spending has been been slashed. Programs involving national security for the Health and Human Services, State and Homeland Security departments have also been cut.

Aid to state governments has also shrunk in the Senate version. Many economists are concerned that this version of the bill won't be big enough.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has spoken out harshly against those cuts, saying they "do violence to what we are trying to do for the future."

"The behavior of the so-called bipartisan group has been outrageous. On the economics, they are pretending to know things they can't possibly know: specifically, (a) how deep and serious the crisis actually is, and (b) what is 'stimulus' and what is not," said economist James Gailbraith. The reality is, professional economists have no clear idea how bad things can get..... The cutbacks to state aid have every potential of being disastrous. What they really reflect is the indifference of people who represent places like Nebraska and Maine to what goes on in New York or California."