Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., on Meet the Press: “You know, the building is on fire, and what we typically do in Washington is argue what color of fire truck do we send to the scene. They do not want us arguing about the color of the fire truck. They want something bold, they want something swift. . . . We could pass this thing on Monday if we would quit playing the political inside-the-Beltway games of figure out a way to get a political advantage.”
A buy-American provision that could start a trade war is not bickering about the color of the fire truck; that’s arguing, “don’t send that pumper truck that’s full of kerosene towards the flames.”
UPDATE: Reader Tom points out:
Since fire trucks would probably never carry tanks of kerosene, perhaps the better analogy is sending a truck full of water to a chemical fire. While it sounds like a good thing to do, it’s more than likely to exacerbate the problem. A truck with foam retardant would be a better choice.
So while the economy is having a chemical fire, McCaskill is calling for us to dump water on it as quickly as we can. A very bad move.