My theory is that the economy goes through a bad patch, and politicians jump all over the place "fixing" things. Eventually, the economy comes back, and the last politician to do some kind of fix ends up with the credit. You'll notice the less-than-spectacular results of the last "stimulus." If this next one doesn't work, they'll do something else, until the cycle coincides with a solution. The government has saved us again! Hey, it worked for Roosevelt.

But that doesn't necessarily mean "do nothing." The idea is to make it easier for those who create wealth and jobs to do that. Best bet is long-term tax relief for businesses, a policy that businesses can actually make long-term plans around. Obama's ideas here don't offer much in that area. The "zero capital gains rate" idea, if enacted as written, is good, but it's pretty much the only thing like that on this list.

Most of his ideas seem to be just shoving tons of borrowed cash into favorite liberal hoppers in return for votes (and a lot of union support). The irony is he's not so much redistributing wealth as he is just making it up out of thin air and passing it around.

Obama needs to know that jobs are a consequence of economic growth, not a primary. We could employ everybody with government money to dig holes and fill them up, but that isn't a wealth generator. A real job winds up with more wealth at the end than you started with. That's when tax revenues start going up.

The word "investment" has a real meaning. It doesn't mean just spending money.