Stop Helping!

Really, we'd be better off if Obama and the Democrats would all just go play golf until Nov. 2012.

Obama has a new plan! God help us.

from Foxsnews.com

"President Obama, in what he described as an "all-hands-on-deck strategy" to boost the economy, announced a new program Monday aimed at training 10,000 new American engineers every year"

Yet again, obama proves he knows nothing with respect to job creation. Where are said 10,000 engineers a year going to find a job? I guess he figures if a bunch of wet behind the ears engineering graduates get together, by golly, they'll just figure out how to jump start this economy. (well, that's how it's worked in his administration hasn't it, oh wait, most of his academic economic advisers have bailed on him)

"The president also announced what he called the "better buildings initiative," a push to upgrade buildings for energy efficiency that would be co-led by former President Bill Clinton. He claimed the upgrades, while putting contractors to work, could in the long run save companies $40 billion a year -- money that could be put to use hiring new workers.

"It is a win-win-win-win proposition," Obama said."

Oy, where to begin with this. This better building initiative is so far behind the curve it is unbelievable. The U.S. Green Building Council, founded in 1993, which developed the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system for buildings, has become the defacto standard for green building design. And, imagine this, this is not a Federal Agency. Nonetheless, the concept took hold in the building industry and the free market nurtured its growth by competition.

Most developers of large scale projects were already requiring the kind of energy efficient design promoted by the LEED rating system. The LEED rating system gave developers a 3rd party certification system from which they could market the efficiency of their buildings. The savings in operating costs go directly to their bottom line.

Taking all the steps to get a building LEED certified adds to the initial cost of a new building. Doing the retrofit to an existing building is even more expensive. In the current economy, I'm not seeing existing building owners clammoring to spend a bunch of money to get their building LEED certified. I'm squinting really hard here, but not seeing any jobs so far.

Obama's quote should read : "It is a win-win-win-win fail-fail-fail proposition," Obama said." There, fixed it for ya.

"In an opinion piece published Monday in The Wall Street Journal, Immelt and American Express CEO and chairman Ken Chennault laid out a series of jobs council ideas to increase employment, including easing visa applications to attract more tourists and the plan to increase energy efficiency in commercial buildings."

Want to bet whether that easing of visa applications "to attract more tourists" includes work visas". What are the odds that those mythical engineering jobs might go to foreign engineers?

Of course, Immelt, being the CEO of General Electric is all over this initiative. The initiative, by itself, will do zip for job creation. If coded into federal law, when the economy does eventually pick up and the building industry recovers, this will be a boon to GE. GE is vested heavily in the the whole global warming, er climate change boondoggle.

Still squinting. No jobs in sight yet.