Where are the jobs?

James Pinkerton.....

The economy is shaping up to be Barack Obama's Katrina. If President George W. Bush was blamed for his slow response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005 -- there was plenty of blame to go around, of course, but the disaster was on Bush's watch--then Obama will get the blame for his slow response to the current recession. The difference, of course, is that Katrina afflicted a city and a few states, while the recession afflicts the whole country.

Unemployment is 9.5 percent and rising fast, certain to go higher than 10 percent. And what is the federal government doing about it? Not much. And so House Republican Leader John Boehner makes a good point when he asks, "Where are the jobs?"

On Sunday, Vice President Joe Biden said that the Obama administration had "misread" the economic indicators. So what are they likely to do about it? More of the same--which is to say, not much.

The problem the Democrats have--and come to think of it, the country has it, too--is that even if you want to build something, you can't do it. That is, you can't do it without plowing through years' worth of lawyers and environmental-impact-statement-writers, nor without enduring endless hearings and lawsuits where every last NIMBY gets a whack at the project. And so even before this terrible recession, America's capacity actually to build anything--build a highway, build a bullet train, build a power plant -- had been crippled.

So piling on new money does no good, because the old money hasn't been getting spent. Getting spent, that is, on bricks and mortar and technology, as opposed to lawyers and consultants. In the past, "stimulus" was a way to put blue collars and hardhats back to work. Yet now, the only people being stimulated are white-collar lobbyists and litigators.

Throughout the city of Cincinnati there are a number of parks with monuments donning the WPA or CCC on them. For a long time I was a Keynesian; believing that government spending can spark a recovery.

However, after going through my liberal sobriety for the past 15 years, I now understand that the government cannot do anything without a thriving economy.

Think about it, Let's assume the Obamunists give a shovel ready job to every unemployed Amercian today. Where will the money come from? We'll borrow it.

OK, Where does the money come from to pay back the debt. It comes through a growing economy where businesses are making money and people are employed thus paying taxes.

Governments cannot and will never be able to sustain jobs without the live blood of money; specifically taxes. No private sector; no money. Yet the Obamunists seem hell bent on destroying job opportunities by creating an anti business climate in this country.

When The Obamunists get that, we'll truly be on the road to recovery.

more..............