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One Year Later – and still waiting for Zack Space’s Stimulus Jobs

One year ago, President Barack Obama signed into law the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (or "Stimulus Bill"), which passed the Congress with a "yea" vote from Rep. Zack Space.

The bill was supposed to bring jobs to an ailing economy in Ohio and elsewhere. Have you seen the jobs that were promised? I haven't.

Before President Obama was even inaugurated, he was insisting on the need for a federal stimulus bill. Unwilling to stand up to the political pressure of the time, Rep. Space fell right into line saying, "Voting for such a large expenditure was a difficult decision," but that "doing nothing was simply not an option." It was not the last miscalculation Rep. Space would make.

Today, it's hard to tell what the difference between passing so-called stimulus bill and just doing nothing would have been, as the only thing that's happened to unemployment in Ohio is that it's gone up to near record levels -- 10.9 percent at last check. Rep. Space and the rest of the Congress have some explaining to do for going along with this boondoggle.

Promises of "millions" of jobs kept being pushed on Americans to swallow the enormous cost. You remember the rhetoric: "shovel-ready jobs," "energy independence," "create or retain" and even a "three to one return on our investment" were being touted as the reasons to pass the $862 billion plan.

Criticism of the plan grew as states, like Ohio, started using the stimulus funds as a one-time budget stop-gap, instead of creating jobs. Our governor used the stimulus dollars to spend state money on entitlements and other programs, instead of making real cuts or even trying to create jobs. When it became clear that Ted Strickland only cared about "creating or retaining" one job -- his own -- I voted against the catastrophic budget plan in the Ohio Senate.

Rep. Space criticized those of us who thought this kind of federal spending was foolish, lashing out at opposition he accused of being "partisan." Now, he and his cronies in Washington bragging that by passing the stimulus bill, they "rescued" the country from economic disaster.

As Rep. Space and administration officials now begin fanning out across the 18th District, to praise the "unquestioned success" -- as Vice President Joe Biden said recently -- of the stimulus bill, remember that their promise was jobs -- jobs that never came.

Bob Gibbs

Candidate for Congress, Ohio’s 18th District