This Week on the Blog Front

This blog is a compilation of several interesting articles I read in the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, and the Huffington Post.

One article in today's Los Angeles Times compares the public works projects built by the WPA and other FDR New Deal agencies to Obama's infrastructure projects, and notes that the projects built THIS:

Grand Coulee Dam in WA

and THIS:

La Guardia Airport, Triborough Bridge

and even THIS:

Whittier High School Auditorium

It goes on to note that Obama's plan creates very few of these monumental projects, with the possible exception of high-speed rail. I would note that high-speed rail is a very important exception (more on the high-speed rail debate later), would disagree with the Times that some of our infrastructure projects are not , and would hope that sooner or later, Obama builds the new infrastructure

Either way, Obama's stimulus/infrastructure package was the main subject of the Governors' Meeting over the weekend, according to a recent New York Times article. Most governors, Democratic and Republican, support Obama on the stimulus package, the most noteworthy Republican crossing lines being our own Arnold Schwarzenegger, who had to take the stimulus money just to balance the budget (For that, the California "I'm-Too-Conservative to-Care-About-the-Public-Good" Republican Party is giving him a vote of no confidence).

The Republican governors who oppose the stimulus package the most, and have hinted they might refuse some or all of the money include Mark Sanford, Bobby Jindal, and Sarah Palin (Where have I heard those names before? Oh, yeah...they're all running for Prez in 2012). According to the Huffington Post, Obama is now taking shots at state governments who oppose him. You can watch the video at the Huffington Post link.

And finally, a recent ABC News poll analyzed Obama's first month. Here are some of their key findings:

*People think Obama was trying to compromise with Republicans by a
3:1 margin, but think that Republicans weren't trying to compromise with Obama, 59-34

*Support for the stimulus plan is 64% overall, but only one in three among Republicans

*Obama holds a 68% approval rating, and an identical 68% of Americans say Obama has brought "Change to Washington"

*The % of Americans who think the country is on the right track has doubled since the election, but is only at 31%

*People think that the stimulus will help their local economy much more than the economy as a whole

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