White House: Stimulus behind 14,315 Minn. jobs

Posted by ErnieGann (anonymous) on October 31, 2009 at 4:02 p.m. (Suggest removal)

According to the Administration's site http://www.recovery.gov/Pages/home.aspx over half a billion dollars ($569,020,000) was spent to "save" 14,315. That comes to $39,750 per job--IF the number of jobs holds up better than the embarrassing screw-up of the preliminary numbers the administration released earlier this week.

How does anyone know if a job has been "saved"?

Nationwide, the majority of the "new" or "saved" jobs were in government. Government does a good job of self-perpetuation.

Posted by bornFree (anonymous) on October 31, 2009 at 5:11 p.m. (Suggest removal)

I know this article was about the stimulus but just let me remind you of Mr. Bush and Mr. Obama.

If George W Bush was an idiot . . . .

If George W. Bush had been the first President to need a teleprompter installed to be able to get through a press conference, would you have laughed and said this is more proof of how inept he is on his own and is really controlled by smarter men behind the scenes?

If George W. Bush had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to take Laura Bush to a play in NYC, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had reduced your retirement plan's holdings of GM stock by 90% and given the unions a majority stake in GM, would you have approved?
If George W. Bush had made a joke at the expense of the Special Olympics, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had given Gordon Brown a set of inexpensive and incorrectly formatted DVDs, when Gordon Brown had given him a thoughtful and historically significant gift, would you have approved?

If George W.. Bush had given the Queen of England an iPod containing videos of his speeches, would you have thought this embarrassingly narcissistic and tacky?

If George W. Bush had bowed to the King of Saudi Arabia, would you have approved?

Posted by bornFree (anonymous) on October 31, 2009 at 5:17 p.m. (Suggest removal)

More about Mr. Bush and Mr. Obama.

If George W. Bush had visited Austria and made reference to the non-existent "Austrian language," would you have brushed it off as a minor slip?

If George W. Bush had filled his cabinet and circle of advisers with people who cannot seem to keep current in their income taxes, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had been so Spanish illiterate as to refer to "Cinco de Cuatro" in front of the Mexican ambassador when it was the 5th of May (Cinco de Mayo), and continued to flub it when he tried again, would you have winced in embarrassment?

If George W. Bush had mis-spelled the word "advice" would you have hammered him for it for years like Dan Quayle and potatoe as proof of what a dunce he is?

If George W. Bush had burned 9,000 gallons of jet fuel to go plant a single tree on Earth Day, would you have concluded he's a hypocrite?

If George W. Bush's administration had okayed Air Force One flying low over millions of people followed by a jet fighter in downtown Manhattan causing widespread panic, would you have wondered whether they actually get what happened on 9-11?

If George W. Bush had failed to send relief aid to flood victims throughout the Midwest with more people killed or made homeless than in New Orleans , would you want it made into a major ongoing political issue with claims of racism and incompetence?

If George W. Bush had ordered the firing of the CEO of a major corporation, even though he had no constitutional authority to do so, would you have approved?

If George W Bush had proposed to double the national debt, which had taken more than two centuries to accumulate, in one year, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had then proposed to double the debt again within 10 years, would you have approved?

So tell me again, what is it about Obama that makes him so brilliant and impressive? Can't think of anything? Don't worry. He's done all this in 9 months -- so you'll have three years and three months to come up with an answer.

Also while we are on the topic, when are those 3,000,000 to 4,000,000 million jobs going to be saved or created?????? I'll be waiting Mr. Obama !!!!!!!

Posted by NoDFL (anonymous) on October 31, 2009 at 7:54 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Great job born free.

Posted by GH2ORepub (anonymous) on October 31, 2009 at 9:22 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Right on BornFree!!!

Posted by hardtail (anonymous) on October 31, 2009 at 11:19 p.m. (Suggest removal)

bornfree - that's got to be the dumbest writing I've seen in quite a while. If george bush wouldn't have squandered almost a trillion dollars away on his daddy's war and tax cuts to the rich we wouldn't be in the mess were in . If george bush would have done that would you have approved??? du, I guess you would have. So much for your I.Q.

Posted by MissIndependent (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 7:27 a.m. (Suggest removal)

This is what makes me dislike politics so much.

You can find fault with every president. Heck, we had Ronald Reagan falling asleep during meetings. Yet, many would argue that he was a very successful leader.

The bottom line is everyone has their "moments" and every President we have ever had has done things that most people would say are questionable.

Does anyone actually stop and remember that all of these people are career politicians with emphasis on the word career? They will do whatever it takes to maintain and expand their careers. That is why I wish we had more independent candidates in office. They may be looking for a career as well but at least they aren't joined to the hip to one political party.

Posted by Warhog (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 8:22 a.m. (Suggest removal)

hardtail engaging in a little class warfare, classic democrat fare for the sheeple.

YES................it is all the evil rich persons fault, do you work for somebody? If you do, you are working for the evil rich man and in return that allows you to earn a paycheck and have some sort of life, after all we all cannot work for .gov

.gov taxes you on your paycheck, taxes the business, taxes the goods produced, taxes the fuel needed to move the goods, taxes the energy used to produce the goods. taxes the things you buy, taxes you property, taxes the services that you use telephone, cable,cell ect. ect. ect. The list goes on and on even you, can see a trend developing here.

It is not the rich man who made this mess, it is the idiots in power that mandate "change" ever hear about the community re development act. Check it out and look how the housing bubble burst. Evil bankers could not say no to a loan even if the knew there was no way it could be payed back

Now look at cap and tax, who is going to line their pockets it's not you and me we get the privilage to guess what pay more...............taxes
Thank You sir, may I have another *smack*
Thank You sir, may I have another *smack*
Thank You sir, may I have another *smack*

Because of big chunks of money go to local,state,federal taxes what is the return on OUR INVESTMENT so far it stinks.

Look at how efficient the cash for clunkers was,
Cash for Clunkers Results Finally In: Taxpayers Paid $24,000 per Vehicle Sold

$160,000 Per Stimulus Job?
Officials acknowledged the numbers were not exact, saying that states and localities that reported the numbers have made mistakes.

CBO Puts House Health Bill Total Cost At $1.055 Trillion
The $1.055 trillion estimate also does not include $245 billion needed to stop Medicare payments to doctors from decreasing, which the House plans to address through separate legislation introduced Thursday.

NEW YORK (AP) - Regulators shut nine banks Friday, including Los Angeles-based California National, as the still-weak economy produces a stream of loan defaults.

There is only so much you can tax and spend, before the system implodes. Honestly I believe that is what they are trying to do.

The blame is not for the evil rich man but the morons who are in charge, it was on their watch it happened, it was their crazy laws, mandates, they think they are above the laws as the write the laws, NOBODY is held accountable, and I MEAN NOBODY.

You cannot blame "king george" forever, he was not the best president we ever had that is for sure, but you better smell what you are shoveling. Look around, this is bigger than blame it on 'king george" because "Bambam" now owns a big part of this mess and it's not all good.

And for the record BOTH party's have failed America and I am a independent thinker.

Posted by bornFree (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 10:50 a.m. (Suggest removal)

hardtail tells me this "bornfree - that's got to be the dumbest writing I've seen in quite a while." Of course it is to a hypocritical democrat like you, what else could it be? Thanks anyway

Posted by NoDFL (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 11:44 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Warhog,

Keep up the good fight. Again and again they will attack the messanger. Look at what they did to bornfree. The problem they face is they are unwilling to talk aout the facts.

Fact: President Obama has spent more money in 10 months than all administrations combined. That has been a lot of different guys and different parties yet no one but has spent like President Obama. We fought a few wars during that time as well.

Fact: You can not say a job was saved. Everytime the press buys into this we saved X number of jobs they violate the basic rules of economics and are dishonest with the American people.

Fact: Some of the jobs used as created (not saved) were created only for 5 days. Wow we could hire a lot of people for a couple of days and claim it works. What a bunch of political spin.

The fact is that both parties are not doing the people's work. Remember they work for us and it is time to get rid of them all. How long will we hear the same old song..... Come on everybody sing it with me...... IT IS BUSH'S FAULT YA YA YA.... Hear me clearly because I sing from the left...... It is all Bush's fault ya ya ya..... If I sing it long enough you will forget about all we have wreaked.... ya ya ya....

Posted by MissIndependent (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 1:04 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Same old, same old.....each side always thinks they are right.

Bush sent us to the wrong country for war and got us started with the debt. He was also in charge when the bailouts happened. So yes, some of this is his fault.

Obama comes in and continues the bailout trend, is trying to slam his health care reform agenda into place, and increases the debt even more. So yes, I have some issues with him too.

The point is, both parties are to blame for this mess. Typical career politicians. Maybe my dream of someone like Ross Perot winning an election will come true someday when people have finally had enough.....well I can dream can't I?

Posted by NoDFL (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 3:28 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Erine,

I liked this line so much and thought it fit here very well. Thanks for sharing it.

"Facts are to liberals as Kryptonite is to Superman."

Posted by ErnieGann (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 3:55 p.m. (Suggest removal)

"Bush sent us to the wrong country for war and got us started with the debt."

I'm not a Bush fan--he should have used the veto pen more often--but these two assertions need to be challenged.

"Got started with the debt"? Go back and check the national debt--it has been going on for a hundred years. Civics 101--"Which branch of government can tax or appropriate money"? Answer--the House of Representatives. To say that "Bush got started with the debt" is not true.

Second issue: "Bush sent us to the wrong country for war." You might remember Bush's statement right after 9/11. He didn't declare war on one or two countries, he declared it on ANY country that harbored terrorists--"Any government that supports, protects or harbours terrorists is complicit in the murder of the innocent and equally guilty of terrorist crimes. "

People easily forget Saddam's actions prior to 9/11. Not only had he lost his war on Kuwait, but he had gassed his own people, rebuilt his army, offerred $25,000 to the families of suicide bombers, kicked the helpless UN inspectors out of the country, and fired on US and British aircraft patrolling the no-fly zone.

Since we had troops there anyway and Saddam was a high-profile target--he started there. Liberals howled that Afghanistan was the "right" war--as though we couldn't fight in two places at once. Now that Iraq is won (despite all efforts of liberals to make their predictions of a "lost" war there come true), we are indeed in Afghanistan--the place liberals thought we should be all along. The predictable liberal response? "The war is unwinnable, pull out!" That wasn't a winning strategy in Vietnam, and it wasn't a winning strategy in Iraq.

You have to wonder which side liberals are on.

Posted by NoDFL (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 4:50 p.m. (Suggest removal)

I am glad someone is finally saying that Obama is treating Afghanistan like Johnson treated Vietnam. Congress should be ashamed. Instead of forcing Government run health care on us why not do what is right and support the troops in Afghanistan. If not pull them out. Please don't subject them to a slow death. Either fight the war to win and do what ever it takes or bring them home where they will be safe. Stop trying to score political points with your base to get a domestic policy passed. By the way nice photo op...... Where is the respect? Go there quietly without the press. Do what is right Mr. President not what you think will help your poll numbers.

Posted by MissIndependent (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 6:13 p.m. (Suggest removal)

I don't disagree that Saddam did awful things and believe me, I haven't lost any sleep over the fact that he is dead and gone. But the priority should have been Bin Laden who was actually responsible for the 9-11 attacks. You will also recall that all of the weapons of mass destruction we kept hearing about didn't actually exist in Iraq. The amount of effort and money spent on this war should have been directed to finding Bin Laden and taking out Al Queida (sorry for the spelling).

We should be more aggressive with Afghanistan and eliminating Al-Qeida. If people think they are no danger, they are naive. These are some of the most dangerous, destructive and sick people in this world. As the old saying goes, "freedom isn't free" and we need make sure we don't have another 9-11.

Posted by Warhog (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 7:55 p.m. (Suggest removal)

I take exception with the photo op as well, Bambam had this released to show he is actively working on this issue, and this is far from the truth. First "if" and that is a big "if" Bambam wanted to show support it should have been done so in private. Anything the whitehouse does is pure political theater, this was done because he is currently "voting present" on the Afghanistan issue.

This draws attention away from the current inaction of the current administration. When a general makes a recommendation, you would have to believe he is the subject matter expert, that is why he is a general.

The general requested more troops, Bambam has done nothing in 60 days, in essence he has withheld support and caused the mission decay, this makes the mission more dangerous, this is detrimental to troop morale, and this is preventable.

This IS COSTING AMERICAN LIVES every day ,this is a very near and dear issue to me for very personal reasons. Dick Cheney aka "Darth Vader" is right in what he said.

This administrations current inaction is a slap in the face, to those who risk it all, and ask for so little, so most of us can sleep at night in our own bed without fear.

Facts,
Saddam was taking pot shots at our aircraft, Saddam had chemical weapons where they went to after gulf 1.0 who knows, as stated before he supported the suicide bombers and payed the families money for a successful operations. So maybe the intelligence was not all that great on some matters but you have to use what information you have and do your best.

If you point the finger at intelligence, look back a little further on why intelligence suffered, back in the early 90's we had massive cuts across the military. This caused a brain drain, logistical issues, retention issues, deployment issues, we were "nation building then" and on a shoe string budget.

MissIndependant.................... you are right 'freedom is not free" somebody is always paying a price and sometimes the price is everything a person has. They do this knowing that it may cost them everything and the still do it of their own free will, because we believe in this nation, while it is not perfect, it's pretty good to live here.

The military deserves better support than this, from the current administration.

Posted by NoDFL (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 9:10 p.m. (Suggest removal)

The AP reviewed a sample of federal contracts, not all 9,000 reported to date, and discovered errors in one in six jobs credited to the $787 billion stimulus program -- or 5,000 of the 30,000 jobs claimed so far.

Even in its limited review, the AP found job counts that were more than 10 times as high as the actual number of paid positions; jobs credited to the stimulus program that were counted two and sometimes more than four times; and other jobs that were credited to stimulus spending when none was produced.

For example:

-- Some recipients of stimulus money used the cash to give existing employees pay raises, but each reported saving dozens of jobs with the money, including one Florida day care that claimed 129 jobs saved.

-- A Texas contractor whose business kept 22 employees to handle stimulus contracts saw its job count inflated to 88 because the same workers were counted four times.

-- The water department in Palm Beach County, Fla., hired 57 meter readers, customer service representatives and other positions to handle two water projects. But their total job count was incorrectly doubled to 114.

http://www.postbulletin.com/newsmanager/...

Posted by NoDFL (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 9:18 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Do you think they might have got it wrong here? Also can someone please explain to me in economic terms how you count a saved job? I have searched all my text books and there is nothing in there. So again how do we claim we "saved" a job?

Posted by NoDFL (anonymous) on November 1, 2009 at 9:22 p.m. (Suggest removal)

The national unemployment rate is at 9.8% - heck, round it to 10% we’ll be there soon enough.

Wasn’t it only a few short months ago that Obama played the fear card, telling Americans that if congress didn’t pass his stimu=less the U.S. would risk experiencing an unemployment rate of 8.5%?
LOL..........

Yup yup yup. It’s a good thing we’re in debt and deficit for trillions and trillions aaand trillions of dollars.
It’s money well-spent. The economy is booming and unemployment is at an all time low.

Posted by leftys2221 (anonymous) on November 2, 2009 at 8:24 a.m. (Suggest removal)

dfl, don't you count jobs added by some people losing their job? You did that with the McDonald's story.

Posted by Warhog (anonymous) on November 2, 2009 at 8:28 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Lefty2221................The democrats count them as public employees now, not working for the evil, greedy, massive corporations.

Posted by NoDFL (anonymous) on November 2, 2009 at 2:51 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Lefty you must be using that "new" math they teach in the white house. Because only you could make that fuzzy math work.

Posted by bornFree (anonymous) on November 2, 2009 at 6:33 p.m. (Suggest removal)

LEFTYS, just so you don't forget, anyone can go to a fast food restaurant and apply for a job and be hired, there is a big turn over in employees, it's not due to them being fired, it's usually hours or the pay just isn't what they expected(their are exceptions) but when a franchise needs a employee they have no problem finding one. Don't be so naive and figure fast food hirings as saving or creating new jobs.