Friday, September 23, 2011

Obama's Bridge to Nowhere Speech

It was billed as taking his case to the voter, the jobs bill speech delivered to the people in Ohio with the backdrop of a bridge in need of repair. Press Secretary Carney proclaimed it not a campaign speech.

The bridge is located in Speaker Boehner's district. The bridge leads to Kentucky, the state represented by a Republican Senator who is also the Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell. Obama called out both of their names as he tried to make his case for his jobs bill, which is not even written into legislation for debating yet.

It was a campaign speech. He used the usual strawmen arguments. He tried to convince the audience that it was those mean Republicans who would not approve of infrastructure spending to create short term jobs, though both parties have a long history of doing just that.

Remember, there is no jobs bill to pass yet, even if all parties involved were prepared to do it tomorrow. It's just a re-election campaign speech theme that Team Obama has glommed on to.

The White House boasted about support for the jobs non-bill from Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory in an email Thursday:

Mayor Mark Mallory said that he, and the citizens of Cincinnati, are "very excited" about the possibility of the Jobs Act passing because it provides funds for infrastructure, and will allow the city to to keep firefighters and police officers on the job.

Mallory doesn't elaborate about the real problem of the federal government supplying funding for local firefighters and police officers - the money runs out. That is why so many states and local governments are facing continued fiscal difficulties. Taking federal stimulus monies only solves a problem short term. Unless real reforms are made at the local level, the cycle repeats. The original stimulus monies doled out in 2009 and 2010 have now run out. The problems were not solved by just throwing taxpayer money at them.

The White House has a bit of a problem with not properly vetting locales, too. This bridge not only has been on the drawing board for replacement for more than a decade but it wouldn't even qualify for stimulus money until 2015, at the earliest.

Smacks not only of politicization but of desperation, too, from the Obama campaign.

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