Do you have to be a Nobel-prize winning economist like Joseph Stiglitz to understand that a fast, effective way to spend our way out of the Bush-GOP-invented economic swamp is to put cash into the hands of the poor? Food stamp increases and extension of unemployment insurance benefits could be done quickly by Congress and would be spent right away by the lower-income people they’d reach.

Yet, of course, the Bush-Pelosi plan doesn’t include them. It could be a worse plan, of course but its mechanism, tax refunds, will take five months (best case) and it directs the pump-priming cash to people who might well bank it instead of spending it. Indeed two-thirds of the money in the Bush-Pelosi plan goes to higher income while only a third goes to poorer people. ( Andrew Leonard at Salon tracks the saddest-funniest food story: Republicans saving the poor from fatness by blocking boost in food stamps. Who knew?) Many, many (too many?) updates (5 sets) are at the end of the post. Also Take Action! Urge a progressive stimulus package! Link at the end. .

This has led progressives like economist-columnist Paul Krugman to pan the Bush-Pelosi deal: