Utah senators vote against stimulus

Both of Utah's senators voted against the economic stimulus bill, saying it would spend too much money, create too much debt and not help the economy enough.

"While this bill includes some cuts in spending from earlier versions, I'm still not satisfied that it would provide sufficient stimulus to justify the long-term problems that it will create," said Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah. "The economy is desperately in need of careful government action, but this bill does not meet that standard."

Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said, "It is hard to feel good about such a bad bill.…Democrats have ramrodded through the Senate an unbalanced spending bill tinged with far too few effective stimulative provisions."

Hatch said the bill will spend between $600,000 and $2 million for every job it creates. "That is outrageous. Surely we can save or create jobs more efficiently than this. It is one thing to save jobs now, and this we need to do, but we should not do so by saddling future generations with so much debt."

The bill now goes to a House-Senate conference to work out differences in versions of the bill passed by each chamber.

— Lee Davidson