Pelosi stresses tech, green spending in stimulus plan
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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi emphasized again today that the coming economic-stimulus spending plan will focus at least in part on boosting the nation’s Internet infrastructure and renewable-energy projects, besides traditional public-works projects like road and bridge construction.
She also signaled that the spending package could reach $600 billion.
In a Bloomberg TV interview, the San Francisco Democrat reiterated her views on using some of the money for technology and green-energy projects. She and President-elect Obama are on the same wavelength on this issue, which ought to encourage Silicon Valley and the green movement as the stimulus package takes form.
From Bloomberg News:
Pelosi said the U.S. House is likely to act next month on a $500 billion to $600 billion economic-stimulus measure aimed at making long-term investments in renewable energy as well as providing a short-term boost for the economy. ‘Economists told us that the package had to be strong enough, half a trillion, $600 billion, somewhere near that,’ Pelosi said in an interview on Bloomberg TV’s ‘Political Capital with Al Hunt.’ She said the legislation will be geared toward some broader Democratic priorities -- such as boosting broadband Internet technology and making environmentally friendly improvements to the nation’s electric-power grid -- in addition to more-traditional road-and-bridge projects. Some of the spending will extend beyond 2009, she said. ‘I hear people say, ‘Oh, they want a 1930s public works project,’ ‘ said Pelosi, 68. ‘No. Certainly we will have public works projects in it, but it’s about broadband for all Americans. It’s about a smart, modern grid to be able to transmit the new, renewable energy -- wind, solar, biofuels, the rest. It’s about a very modern approach to building the infrastructure of America. ‘Some of the money would be spent beyond one year,’ she said. ‘It would be about infrastructure, rebuilding America’s infrastructure -- creating good-paying jobs in America; innovation, to do so in a new, green way that causes a green revolution in our country.’