WASHINGTON – On Monday September 6, President Obama spoke at a rally in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to discuss a new White House plan to stymie the outflow of jobs from our bleeding economy.

According to The Huffington Post, the president was combative when he discussed the serial obstructionism of his counterparts on the other side of the aisle. He also unveiled a long-term program valued at $50 billion to rebuild infrastructure around the United States.

Leaders from the Republican Party have spent almost all of the last two years attacking the president and the Democrats on unemployment. They have pointed to the fact that unemployment is now at 9.5 percent despite assurances from the Democrats that unemployment would not go above 8 percent if we agreed to pass the stimulus. What they completely ignore is the fact that the stimulus was largely written by Republicans. It was full of Republican amendments and Republican ideas. All of those have failed and now the Republicans can blame the other side because none of them voted for the stimulus bill even after adding more than 200 amendments to the legislation.

One would not be totally out of line to think that Republicans may have intentionally filled the stimulus with bad projects and worthless spending hoping that it would fail.

Now, the president has finally decided to do what his predecessor would have done. President Obama is now organizing plans without any consultation from his opponents. This $50 billion project is a perfect example.

President Obama’s decision to try to gather money for infrastructure projects is precisely what our economy needs. Whether the jobs created are temporary, permanent, part-time, or full-time they will be jobs. More than that, they will be quality jobs.

For the millions of unemployed Americans it will be a sigh of relief. For our crumbling infrastructure it will be a welcome respite. For the hundreds of thousands of workers who are fully qualified to work on the projects it will be an opportunity.

More than anything else, the infrastructure proposal will be something that Democrats can point to in November when Americans head to the polls.

According to many leading economists, as reported by CNNMoney.com, the new Obama proposal is simply too little too late to save the American economy.

It may be true at this point that the U.S. economy is simply beyond saving, but that is not the object of this program. The U.S. needs trillions of dollars in infrastructure investments in the next two decades to keep up with the degradation of our transportation lines. The government will never be able to afford such a building project. What it can afford is a fast and simple infusion of capital just in time to swing a few close elections.

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