The purpose of the "stimulus package" is to stimulate consumers and businesses back to a level of unsustainable borrowing and spending.

The unsustainable borrowing and spending is meant to be spent on SUV's and supersized "McMansions".

So the whole package is flawed. As Ms. Shapiro asserts, the "stimulus package" is backward facing. The package should be called the "stupid package".

The way forward is to do away with excessive borrowing and spending. Instead of setting a bad example for consumers and companies, the Federal Government should be showing restraint by reducing their spending.

Perhaps if the Federal Government actually started living within it's means for the first time in about a decade, perhaps the economy would begin it's restructuring with a look to the future.

The future should be less borrowing, less consumption, less SUV's and less McMansions. Yes, the GM union worker will likely lose his job and GM will be forced to close up shop. However this will lead the way for more productive companies to produce personal transportation of the future.

Unfortunately, our ham fisted politicians are about to pass a legislation for the "stupid package" to go ahead.

President Obama is still living in the past (1932 to be exact - he thinks he's the reincarnation of President Roosevelt). Perhaps in the next year or so he'll catch up to 2009 and figure out that stimulating excess borrowing and consumption is a "thing of the past".

Green initiatives are on everyone's minds, and no person or company can deny the importance of sustainability and the need for a solid investment in our future. However, America should know that before we can invest in future initiatives, it is an absolute necessity to look at the here and now.

The fact remains that America is hurting right now- and we're not alone. You talk of a transplant where one isn’t quite possible- at least not right now. Seeing as this isn't a place anyone in America has seen since World War II, we as Americans are starting to gain some real perspective. President Obama has recognized the need for a stimulus that comes in the form of job creation and has been tried and true in his agenda when outlining his package's expenditures and allocations. Let's hope that agenda is acted on sooner rather than later.