Transparency is on at the White House- however, I expect President Obama wishes it wasn’t quite so transparent. Turns out information being sent in regarding what the stimulus has done to boost employment is somewhat inaccurate.
The Associated Press started the now-mainstream stimulus critique reports a few weeks back- doing a commendable job as watchdog- and put the White House on stimulus defense. Now, however, comes a new wrinkle in stimulus efficiency and White House competence- namely, the White House is reporting job numbers in congressional districts that don’t exist.
To be fair, I am not blaming the administration. It’s not their fault people reporting numbers don’t know what district they live in. However, it does not look good on the heels of the AP report (which was, admittedly, preliminary) and the other stories regarding stimulus measuring difficulties that have come out recently.
I first heard about this new debacle from The Heritage Foundation. However, like a good little newly-arrived blogger, I double-checked two of the claims Heritage made. Guess what? They are accurate.
Unfortunately, Democrats and liberals can defend against the claims the stimulus isn’t working. Yes, these public relations disasters makes President Obama, Democrats and the stimulus look rather dumb in the public eye. Yes, it’s great fodder for conservative blogs, newspapers, radio and TV shows and speeches. Yes, it speaks volumes about government incompetence and wasteful spending ($18 million to overhaul the site and this is the inaccuracy they get?). However, if the jobs were created- and for the moment let’s assume they were and aren’t overstated by the same people who don’t know what district in which they live- doesn’t that lend credence to President Obama’s claim that the stimulus worked?
Personally, I say no. I say it is another obvious harbinger for Democratic health care reform, the EFCA, cap-and-trade and the renewal of NCLB next year that government can run very little well, especially proven over the last decade. Maybe my libertarian college friend Jon O’Neill is right and a third-party candidate will win the 2012 presidential race. It would serve Republicans and Democrats right.
November 17th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
In fairness, having just read the politico article on this, it seems as if it is a self-report system, and that its the business oweners, not the government officials, who are clueless about the congressional districts they are in.
November 17th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
WSU,
I agree it’s the business owners who are clueless; I’m sorry if that didn’t come through clearly. However, it’s still the system that’s a) gumming business owners up in general, and b) allowing very inaccurate information to get through.
November 17th, 2009 at 8:53 pm
No jobs were created with the stimulus, and 90% of the jobs saved were union jobs that may have been on the chopping block due to budget cuts and are, frankly, jobs we shouldn’t be saving in the first place.
So by my math all Obama has to show for his 787 billion dollar plan is 6,000 jobs(10% of 60,000, assuming that number is accurate, which we all know is not). According to the Herald Examiner (http://www.examiner.com/x-21433-Middlesex-County-Libertarian-Examiner~y2009m9d1-How-much-stimulus-money-has-been-spent-as-of-September-2009) 14.5% of the stimulus funds have been spent thus far, or $84.587 billion
, which works out to $14.097833216 million dollars per private sector job saved.
Let me repeat that: For every fourteen million, ninety seven thousand, eight hundred and thirty three dollars and twenty two cents of YOUR TAX MONEY the federal government spent on this stimulus, it “created or saved” JUST ONE PRIVATE SECTOR JOB. Frankly, that level of incompetence is breathtaking. I bet if the government had given over $13 million to random people off the street with no strings attached the record of private sector jobs created or saved would be better than this. Hell, even if you include the government jobs into the mix that’s still almost one and a half million spent for every job saved and, like I said, that includes a hell of a lot of jobs that should be lost if we ever want to get our economy back on track.
But yeah, that Sarah Palin, what a moron.