Mostly government infrastructure was "created or saved"

When the stimulus bill was proposed by the socialist Republican/Democrat power structure we were told that the purpose was to create jobs right now by borrowing money to pay-forward repairs to infrastructure as well as make strategic improvements.

By infrastructure we were given to understand that they were talking about "roads and bridges." We were told scary stories about bridge co lapses, studies on traffic gridlocks, and fairy tales about efficient rail transport.

These were all proper goals of government and would have to be built or repaired sooner or later and why not right now when folks are out of work and these things would be paid for with dollars that were about to experience a massive devaluation?

While I'm always and everywhere against government spending beyond their budget, and I think the that roads are usually best built by the most local government possible, in this case I thought that they had at least made a good case. I was and am still against it, but I could see how a person without fixed principles could think this was a good idea.

I thought in the long run it would have a harmful net effect, so I opposed it on principle,but I thought they had made a convincing case that the negative net long term effect would be minimal and the short term effect would help a lot of people.

It turns out though that instead of building physical infrastructure the Obama administration is mostly building Federal government infrastructure. This is harmful in the short term, mid term and long term. It is also being financed by the last bit of credit our government has.

This means that they will not be able to later fund the physical infrastructure they said we need. It also means that any funds they raise from increasing taxes will be wasted on new federal employees that we didn't need before and won't need in the future, but will prove hard to get shut of none the less.

As to the new phrase "created or saved" it is such an affront to the sensibilities that one doesn't even have to go to the obvious question of how do you prove you saved a particular job. No, my chief objection is to the idea that a president can create or save meaningful work. Other than by hiring a few personal staff members how does he do this?

If the work is meaningful then it neither needs a hero to create it nor to save it. Everything else is "make-work" that is both meaningless and futile in that it costs taxpayers more than it benefits them. Also the money stays longer in the low-velocity public sector which drags a capitalist economy down by lowering the number of times that money changes hands per year.

Can a politician create meaningful jobs by perhaps singing to the American people to stimulate the economy as one does garden plants? Not even by singing on T.V., radio, and Internet could a president stimulate the economy on a day to day basis. About the only thing a president can do is set up favorable long term conditions by cutting the taxes and red-tape that smothers our small businesses, and protecting our manufacturing sector from unfair trade.