Happy Recovery Summer
President Obama, when not vacationing, is celebrating “Recovery Summer:” a splendid season of success for our new federally managed economy. Well, the roadside sign industry certainly appears to be enjoying a renaissance. In a happy coincidence, stimulus constipation has been relieved just in time for the mid-term congressional elections, judging by the dozen or so “Putting America to Work” signs that have sprouted like wildflowers along my commute corridor the past couple of weeks.
Every public construction project, no matter how trivial, is festooned with self-congratulatory monuments to Obama-directed victory over the Great Recession. The nearby photo shows one such calling attention to an apparent sidewalk repair project in a leafy suburban neighborhood -- not a worker in sight. But for all I know, legions of former Census-takers are even now swarming the neighborhood, heroically caulking and weatherstripping the way to vibrant economic growth.
Whatever the economic results from this latest providentially delayed burst of federal spending, expect a bumper crop of shovel-ready signs between now and the election.
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May '10
Re: Happy Recovery Summer
What an embarrassment. That sign's just resting on the ground! In America! Where are the unionized carpenter jobs, to prop those puppies up? Where are the TARP funds to pay community college administrators (job 1!) to hire teachers (job 2!) to retool laid-off autoworkers (job 3!) in how to take a Harry Re...I mean, a tool, to a 2x4? Where are the paperless (Green! Yeah!) immigrants to build a sign easel, a job Americans clearly don't want to do?
I usually save this for my evening prayers, but: Ted Kennedy, where you at, brother!
Jun '10
Re: Happy Recovery Summer
Maybe on those signs, they could put photos of some of the five-year-olds who will be paying the interest on the stimulus until they're about eighty-five-years old.
Jul '10
Re: Happy Recovery Summer
I am not a defender of either TARP or ARRA, but those two legislative boondoggles shouldn't be conflated. Also, it's difficult for me to read the timestamp on that photo, but it looks like 08:25 — a bit early for construction workers to be jackhammering a sidewalk to install an ADA ramp (or whatever the project actually is). In covering local city councils here in western Orange County, I have found that pavement rehabilitation (from slurry sealing to stripping & resurfacing) and installing ADA ramps are two of the most popular applications of ARRA funds. Such projects are usually part of a town's infrastructure maintenance plan. They're well understood by staff, planned for ahead of time, and wait for funding to become available before being put out to bid. The workers are employed by local private construction companies. Beyond indenturing my grandchildren to Washington, DC, ARRA enfeebles local control, making local governments dependent on federal funds. Two strong reasons to oppose another "stimulus" round.
May '10
Re: Happy Recovery Summer
Does anyone else think the marketing team who produced the phrase "Putting America to work" should join the ranks of the unemployed? "Putting America to work" conjures up a wealth of imagery... the little guy should be proudly lifting a hammer above his head, or doggedly swinging his pick in the Motherland's salt mines.
Meanwhile, Ohio is spending $7.8 million we don't have so we can make the most of $400 million the federal government doesn't have for a light rail boondoggle, our "marquee federal stimulus project." Yeah, that might be a good idea, if not for the stubbornness of Ohioans who enjoy driving their own cars on the interstate system that already exists.
May '10
Re: Happy Recovery Summer
...and the fact that several half-empty Greyhound buses already run the Cleveland-Columbus-Cinci route daily.
May '10
Re: Happy Recovery Summer
Politicians have always arranged erected these signs around major projects, for all the obvious reasons. In the past, though, the purity of the exercise was tarnished by sweaty workers, construction machinery, holes in the ground, and -- you know -- actual civic improvements. Barack Obama has done away with all that. He has stripped politics of all that messy governing stuff, reduced it to its essential aspect.
ARRA signs are the visible manifestation of the Platonic Idea of politics. They are the styrofoam Greek columns, the ranks of scrubbed children arrayed in the background of stirring speeches, the mature vegetables sprung from the White House garden like Athena from the brow of Zeus.
And on the pedestal these words appear ... "Look upon my public works, ye Mighty, and despair!" Nothing beside remains.
May '10
Re: Happy Recovery Summer
(Oops ... that should begin "Politicians have always erected these signs ...")
May '10
Re: Happy Recovery Summer
But maybe some healthy cynicism is developing: Earlier this year and with the help of a vandal, a sign near me read, "This project funded by.... OUR KID'S MONEY!" with the ARRA words blotted out. It stayed that way for the duration of the project.