Saturday, September 25, 2010

Stimulus money at work in Illinois

Today's Wisconsin State Journal (or the letters at Madison.com) ran a letter from a couple that wrote about all the projects, funded by (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) ARRA money, they noticed on their road trip out west. They complained that the right has been claiming that the stimulus has done nothing, and none of the "shovel ready" projects have been started.

I know how they feel. While on my road trip to Chattanooga, my first two days of driving through Illinois were marked by constant detours and slow downs due to road projects, most of which had signs noting that they had been funded through ARRA. Everywhere I went, there were orange barrels.

At the same time, as I crawled along interstates and two-lane rural roads, I listened to the talking heads of the right complaining that the President had lied to the American public about getting people back to work. They said over and over again that the stimulus money had funded almost no projects to date.

Can I suggest that these mouthpieces try driving the route I took? When they have yet again been detoured by an ARRA funded project on their way to the next town, we can interview them about the "nonexistent" stimulus projects, and how no one has been put to work.

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