By now, Americans are beginning to get the news about how unreliable or shall I say made up, the statistics are regarding the “stimulus jobs” really are. My post yesterday, “Even Obama’s Make-Believe Jobs Are Not Real,” gratus, Dan Mitchell of the Cato Institute and The Washington Examiner, which provided an interactive map pointing out the bogus jobs claimed in various states. Right on the heals of that post, Kathy Hoesktra posted “Stimulating! Ten New Congressional Districts in Michigan!,” detailing the jobs created in Michigan in congressional districts that don’t exist.
Now, thanks to many, many others, who are digging into the big job scam, the truth about the “stimulus” and its misallocation of resources and complete failure, is coming to light. Hans Bader, over at the Open Market blog (the blog of the Competitive Enterprise Institute), writes, “President Obama’s $800 billion stimulus package creates imaginary jobs, while destroying ones in the real world. Billions from the stimulus are being spent on creating tens of thousands of imaginary jobs in 440 phantom Congressional districts, according to the government’s own web site:
Just how big is the stimulus package? Well for one, it has doubled the size of the House of Representatives, according to recovery.gov, which says that funds were distributed to 440 congressional districts that do not exist. . . . The web site operates on an $84 million budget and is tasked with monitoring the distribution of the $787 billion stimulus package passed by Congress–which, for the record, counts 435 members–in early 2009.
The site’s monitors, however, are not too savvy about America’s political or geographic landscape. More than $2 million was given to the 99th District of North Dakota, a state which has only one congressional district. In order to qualify for 99 districts, North Dakota would have to have a population of about 60 million people, almost 24 million more people than California.
To read the rest of this excellent post, “Stimulus Package Creates Imaginary Jobs, Destroys Jobs in the Real World,” with all of the links to the facts, click on the title.
The administration is already claiming “human error” of course, however one does not create 440 new congressional districts, claim thousands of new jobs which have either been “created or saved” and explain it away as human error. What is being spoon-fed to the American people, at a time of economic crisis and rising unemployment, now at 10.2%, are falsehoods. Remember, this is the “transparency presidency.” However, there is nothing transparent about the narrative of “jobs created or saved” by these misguided economic policies.
I’m wondering if this newly found “transparency” might not just disappear from sight. But what I really hope disappears are the misguided economists who are advising the President by pushing Keynesian economic “solutions” for this government created recession. Now where did I put my magic wand!
