Follow the Stimulus, Part 3

I hope they wait for the old lightbulbs to go out before replacing them.

People do not and will not pay attention to these inaccuracies because they do not want anyone to question Obama. Sometimes it feels like I am stuck in this twilight zone…and then you have Newsweek saying that Obama is above America, above the world, like a god (little g).

ctmom:”I hope they wait for the old lightbulbs to go out before replacing them.”
Incandesent bulbs are not high embodied energy items and they are very high energy consumers, so it actually makes sense to replace them prior to them going out.
Actually, a lot of commercial facilities replace bulbs on a schedule rather than when they go out. It’s far easier to deal with the labor requirements and to maintain a safe facility (if you only have three guys and 500 bulbs go out on the same morning, you could have a problem).

Jake – For context, are you finding every project that you look into is exaggerated, or are you just reporting on the ones that are? Is 90% of it accurate so far, are is 0% of it accurate so far?

Thanks for keeping at this, Mr. Tapper, even when your efforts appear to be generally unappreciated. Actually, I am kind of relieved to find out, as with the housing project in DC, that this project is going to cost far less than the stimulus report said. As you note, 109 million to retrofit just one VA hospital sounds like quite a boondoggle. So when we learn that covers all the VA hospitals in the state and that this particular hospital will “only” spend 3 million, I breathe a sigh of relief.
Hope you also uncover some of the waste and corruption undoubtedly to be found in the stimulus spending. And I’d like to see more stories about where some of the money is going beyond road projects and making government buildings “green,” which is mostly what I have been hearing and reading about of late.
I know, for example, that a ton of money is allocated for health care and it was suggested today that many of the jobs President Obama claims he will ‘create or save’ this summer are in that field. So what sort of “health care” spending is the government doing?

Nothing. The stimulous has brought nothing to us. I have taken a HUGE pay cut and my husband has lost his job. All after this stimulous was supposed to fix everything. Not just my husbands work, but many places in our town and the neighboring towns too.
I am having doubts about Obama now. What did he really spend the money on? I probably don’t want to know.
But jobs and keeping jobs was apparently not on the list.
Now there is talk of gas prices rising. Why? For what? Obama is looking to take more money from us now by raising our gas prices.
I’m getting real fed up real fast with him. He doensn’t get as fair as a shake as he should, my temper is short, times are hard. He said he would step up and bring change quickly. Where is it???

“Do you believe the creation of the internet – a much smaller government ‘pork’ project – impact the economy? Interstate highways? Universal education?”
We are creating something like the internet in the Stimulus? Is that the hope? I thought it was “shovel ready” stuff? Internet took nearly a decade to become the impact that it did, thats not going to help this summer or even next year.
Point being, this was sold as an answer here, an answer now. But it’s on a grand scale of a nudging a cruise liner with a paddle boat. I’m just being a realist here.

stimulu = government waste and abuse. Did anybody really expect anything else? Whenever the Feds get involved, the result is always the same, an inefficient bureaucratic mess that needs billions of taxpayer money to fund it. Do people realize that Obama is a complete fraud?

JHW539..actually the creation of the internet DID NOT stimulate the economy. What stimulated the economy was the free market growth of hardware, software, lick companies and even ad profits from websites that proliferated once the internet began expanding. Sort of commercial air time and transponder stations that wwas sold and built as the television age blossomed. Infrastructure can stimulate an economy over time, but the problem with that is that long term spending inctreases inflation and does not immediately correct the problem that is causing the average citizen pain. Good example is to compare tax cuts as stimulus with infrastructure spending. In Both 83 and 93 when reagan and Later Bush cut taxes as a method to turn the economy and restore jobs.. the result was rather quick. Regans economy went from 11.5% unemployment to 8% in 9 months and continued down to less than 7% in just over 1 year, Bush went from 7.5% unemployment to 5%in 8 months ( both sets fo figures are from the US Department of the Labor web site). Under Obama’s “infrastructure” spending in the first 5 months, unemployment has wnet from 7% to 9.4% and continues to rise. Most of the stimulus package to date has been spent on increasing welfare and unemployment benefits (about 75 of the total bill) while most of the programs that might actually add jobs over time have not yet been funded iand in some cases won’t be for over two years. What is the point of committing 800 billion to ease the pain of a recession ( that will run its course in about 2 years on its own) if none of the money will be used in time to do any good?

jhw539– by the way, the internet was never a government “pork project” No bill was ever passed that established the development of the internet by the government as a private industry “shovel ready” project. It was a government sponsored undertaking that was found to have far reaching benefits to the private sector.

“…actually the creation of the internet DID NOT stimulate the economy. What stimulated the economy was the free market growth of hardware, software, lick companies and even ad profits from websites that proliferated once the internet began expanding.”
Isn’t this kind of like saying that building a greenhouse doesn’t produce any more flowers, it’s the plants that you put in it that do?

You reporters will never be able to track this stuff down… Joe Biden can’t even do it…

Somebody doing actual reporting in ObamaLand?
It boggles the mind.

Jake – For context, are you finding every project that you look into is exaggerated, or are you just reporting on the ones that are? Is 90% of it accurate so far, are is 0% of it accurate so far?
jlw – WHY should ANYONE have to report on it. Where is all this transparency you claim this administration has accompished?
Obamanomics….hard at work!