Obama Plans Largest Building Program Since 1950s

Bloomberg.com: Worldwide

By Hans Nichols

Dec. 6 (Bloomberg) -- President-elect Barack Obama said heâ??????ll make the â?????single largest new investmentâ??? in roads, bridges and public buildings since the Eisenhower Administration to lift the sagging economy and create jobs.

Obama, in his weekly radio speech today, said his plan to create or preserve 2.5 million jobs will also include making public buildings more energy efficient, repairing schools and modernizing health care with electronic medical records.

â?????We wonâ??????t just throw money at the problem,â??? he said. â?????Weâ??????ll measure progress by the reforms we make and the results we achieve -- by the jobs we create, by the energy we save, by whether America is more competitive in the world.â???

Obama spoke a day after a government report showed employers in the U.S. slashed 533,000 jobs last month, the biggest decline in 34 years. The losses are â?????another painful reminder of the serious economic challenge our country is facing,â??? Obama said.

The speech offered the first details of Obamaâ??????s job- creation program. He said the investment in infrastructure will be the largest since President Dwight D. Eisenhower created the interstate highway system a half-century ago.

â?????When Congress reconvenes in January, I look forward to working with them to pass a plan immediately,â??? he said. Obama takes office as the 44th president on Jan. 20.

Congressional Democrats

With the economy heading toward the longest and deepest recession since World War II, pressure is rising for a spending program that will create new jobs. Congressional Democrats have said they will send Obama an economic stimulus package as soon as he takes office. New York Senator Charles Schumer late last month put the size of such a program at between $500 billion and $700 billion.

In addition to investing in infrastructure, requiring energy standards on public buildings and updating health-care practices, Obama said that he will start a â?????sweeping effort to modernize and upgrade school buildingsâ??? and will boost broadband access across America.

To the states that will be the conduits for the funding, he had a simple message: â?????use it or lose it.â???

â?????If a state doesnâ??????t act quickly to invest in roads and bridges in their communities, theyâ??????ll lose the money,â??? he said.

Obamaâ??????s plan to make public buildings more energy efficient should reduce the governmentâ??????s energy bill, which he called the highest in the world. He plans to replace heating systems and install energy-efficient light bulbs.

Internet Upgrade

Obama also plans to upgrade Internet infrastructure, calling it â?????unacceptable that the United States ranks 15th in the world in broadband adoption.â???

Upgrading health care is the final component of the plan. By introducing new technology and electronic medical records, he said health-care workers could â?????prevent medical mistakes, and help save billions of dollars each year.â???

Obama, in Chicago for the weekend, has no public events scheduled for today. Tomorrow, he will mark the anniversary of the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor with a news conference in Chicago, according to a statement from his transition team.

Obama will announce his choice to lead the Department of Veterans Affairs at the news conference, according to a Democratic aide who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

To contact the reporter on this story: Hans Nichols in Chicago at hnichols2@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: December 6, 2008 15:12 EST

yea great idea, that's exactly what we need!!!

Good luck Barack you're gonna need it! That is a very good start, but you have A huge mountain to climb.

min0 lee said:

making public buildings more energy efficient

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i was thinking that this morning. do you know almost all government jobs leave their comps on 24/7? just a program to shut the monitors off would save tons of money. there's so much waste in this country and we have no one with an ounce of common sense saying wait a fucking minute about shit like this...


maybe the money we flush down the great American toilet could be put to better use.

Little Wing said:

i was thinking that this morning. do you know almost all government jobs leave their comps on 24/7? just a program to shut the monitors off would save tons of money. there's so much waste in this country and we have no one with an ounce of common sense saying wait a fucking minute about shit like this...


maybe the money we flush down the great American toilet could be put to better use.

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that makes for a nice banner, but is really stupid when you think about it. given the choice I'm sure anyone would choose to be a homeless person than a prisoner of war. It's not like prisoners of war are kept in a marriot. how many of our enemies follow the geneva convention? hell the best kept prisoners of war are in guantanamo and i cant think of anyone willing to volunteer to go there.

I must say. as much as I have opposed obama his move to the middle since his election has been quite nice. I support his investment in our infrastructure. I'm willing to give the guy the benefit of the doubt at first. an investment in the infrastructure is an investment in the economy. he doesn't talk about how he will pay for it or other programs he has, but maybe he will follow through on fiscal responsibility. I want everyone to have an EMR as well. lets see if he can help out there without too much government over lordship which will just create more problems.

I like this idea also, why go against it?
Should we let it erode?



Question, you would prefer less government?
Why? I want to hear your opinion.

min0 lee said:

I like this idea also, why go against it?
Should we let it erode?



Question, you would prefer less government?
Why? I want to hear your opinion.

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Yes I would prefer less government overall, however if a stimulus is needed then I think Obama is headed in the right direction. Giving out free money to failed institutions is not a winning strategy, however creating jobs by investing in public works and infrastructure is an investment in our future.

I do not condone deficit spending in any way shape or form, however it would be naive to think that the current incarnation of government will stop. If we have to be borrowing this money, at least we may eventually see a return on our investment via increased revenue in taxes from improved infrastructure. That's far superior to seeing our bailout money going to these CEOs' bank accounts and to fund bank acquisitions.

Little Wing said:

i was thinking that this morning. do you know almost all government jobs leave their comps on 24/7? just a program to shut the monitors off would save tons of money. there's so much waste in this country and we have no one with an ounce of common sense saying wait a fucking minute about shit like this...


maybe the money we flush down the great American toilet could be put to better use.

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Oh I agree. Most government computer use unnecessary amounts amounts of power. They could benefit quite a bit from virtualization and replacing their desktops with thin clients that potentially use only 5-10W of power. If Microsoft would get off of their asses and work with IBM to port Windows to the s390 (Mainframe) then I think this could happen. As much as I like Linux, most agencies have custom programs and that wouldn't run on it and the amount of retraining needed would be huge.

min0 lee said:

I like this idea also, why go against it?
Should we let it erode?



Question, you would prefer less government?
Why? I want to hear your opinion.

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I'm not sure if this is directed at me or not, but I will take a shot at it.

I absolutely want less government. The government that governs least, governs best. The government should ensure the safe and efficient flow of commerce (read good roads and infrastructure), provide for the common safety (police), and provide for a strong military defense. outside of that I think we should have as little government as possible.

I find government interference to be restrictive and inefficient to growth. The government taxes us to provide social programs. I like the concept of social programs. the idea of helping ones neighbor less fortunate is the heart of Christianity. problem is the government is not as good at it as private non-profit organizations. In addition to all of the taxes we pay for these social programs, the American people constantly give to help others. look at what private organizations did in the aftermath of Katrina, or any number of world wide disasters. put the money back in our pockets and we will have more money to give to those things that we want to help.

Little Wing said:

i was thinking that this morning. do you know almost all government jobs leave their comps on 24/7? just a program to shut the monitors off would save tons of money. there's so much waste in this country and we have no one with an ounce of common sense saying wait a fucking minute about shit like this...

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I agree with your statement regarding waste, but PCs aren't a part of that problem. All PCs since 1996 have power saving features built in. For example, if you haven't used the mouse or keyboard for a while, the PC will power down the monitor. After a couple of hours, the hard drive will spin down.

DOMS said:

I agree with your statement regarding waste, but PCs aren't a part of that problem. All PCs since 1996 have power saving features built in. For example, if you haven't used the mouse or keyboard for a while, the PC will power down the monitor. After a couple of hours, the hard drive will spin down.

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Easy to shut off though... I do it

DOMS said:

I agree with your statement regarding waste, but PCs aren't a part of that problem. All PCs since 1996 have power saving features built in. For example, if you haven't used the mouse or keyboard for a while, the PC will power down the monitor. After a couple of hours, the hard drive will spin down.

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You would be surprised how many organizations turn those features off completely. Personally I would be more inclined to push out a companywide standby at say 9PM (Give a 5 minute warning to hit Cancel if you are still there working) and then at 7-8AM issue a companywide WOL. By doing that you are eliminating much of that wasted energy.

Mind you I still think virtualization is the better option, but that's another alternative.

DOMS said:

I agree with your statement regarding waste, but PCs aren't a part of that problem. All PCs since 1996 have power saving features built in. For example, if you haven't used the mouse or keyboard for a while, the PC will power down the monitor. After a couple of hours, the hard drive will spin down.

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the article i read mentioned that feature being bypassed. everyone does it, i do, but i also turn my monitor off at least when im not sitting here.

i wish i'd bookmarked the article but i didn't

Federal employees are urged not to leave computers running (8/27/08) -- www.GovernmentExecutive.com

here's something like it. i don't get why anyones comp needs that long to cold boot? the thing i read said they wanted to put everyones comps into seep mode at least

danzik17 said:

You would be surprised how many organizations turn those features off completely. Personally I would be more inclined to push out a companywide standby at say 9PM (Give a 5 minute warning to hit Cancel if you are still there working) and then at 7-8AM issue a companywide WOL. By doing that you are eliminating much of that wasted energy.

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this was the gist of the article.

the government buildings around here, schools, everything are big old monsters that must be a bitch to heat and soooo many of them have tons of empty space they are heating now for no reason.

Okay so who do they hire to build those roads? Any of us speak spanglish? If so we can work for $9hr, or less, and build bridges.

You, each and every one of y0ou reading this post, needs at least $18hr to get out of bed. If it involves actual work, like saaaaay swinging from a back harness and setting columnation forming at some 100 feet off the ground you might want tad bit more. The messican will happily swing out there and do that yob for $9hr no problem.

Little Wing said:

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The POW got there because he/she was doing their job, the homeless person got there most likely because they refuse to do any job.....

My work computer goes into hibernation after 30 minutes, if I know I'm gonna be gone a while I just push the power button on front and it hibernates right away.... I setup all of the computers in my division to work that way but we are an alternative energy company so we have a reputation to uphold, our pure sales workstations are all thinclients as well....the only computer that stays on is our server and it is on a solar backup unit.....

BoneCrusher said:

Okay so who do they hire to build those roads? Any of us speak spanglish? If so we can work for $9hr, or less, and build bridges.

You, each and every one of y0ou reading this post, needs at least $18hr to get out of bed. If it involves actual work, like saaaaay swinging from a back harness and setting columnation forming at some 100 feet off the ground you might want tad bit more. The messican will happily swing out there and do that yob for $9hr no problem.

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I'd rather the Mexican get it than Haliburten.

BoneCrusher said:

Okay so who do they hire to build those roads? Any of us speak spanglish? If so we can work for $9hr, or less, and build bridges.

You, each and every one of y0ou reading this post, needs at least $18hr to get out of bed. If it involves actual work, like saaaaay swinging from a back harness and setting columnation forming at some 100 feet off the ground you might want tad bit more. The messican will happily swing out there and do that yob for $9hr no problem.

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i worked for 15 dollars an hour as a laborer in a nuclear power plant. probably some of the worst conditions I can think of personally. it helped pay for college and I think it was damn good money. their are plenty of US citizens willing to accept lower wages if that is all they can get. remember, unemployment is up. and those citizens making 9 or 10 dollars an hour are going to want goods/services. an investment in infrastructure helps everyone. better roads=safer/faster travel for goods and services. think of how many goods are transported by semi truck here in the US. i'll give obama the benefit of the doubt.

BoneCrusher said:

Okay so who do they hire to build those roads? Any of us speak spanglish? If so we can work for $9hr, or less, and build bridges.

You, each and every one of y0ou reading this post, needs at least $18hr to get out of bed. If it involves actual work, like saaaaay swinging from a back harness and setting columnation forming at some 100 feet off the ground you might want tad bit more. The messican will happily swing out there and do that yob for $9hr no problem.

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as long as they don't sub-contract I don't see this happeneing. It's against federal law to do so.
Wouldn't the roads fall under DOT? They make decent money.

maniclion said:

The POW got there because he/she was doing their job, the homeless person got there most likely because they refuse to do any job.....

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The homeless are entitled to food, shelter and free medical.....they just chose to live that way.

maniclion said:

The POW got there because he/she was doing their job, the homeless person got there most likely because they refuse to do any job.....

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i live in Maine it's 40 below 0 here. makes it easy to be sympathetic to people i see around the shelters. i think a lot of them are dealing with mental issues, none of them seem "normal". i think in a lot of cases it's maybe more complicated than they just won't work especially the teens.

thesky85 said:

Hello every body !I'm new member here.I"m 20 years old, I'm female from Viet Nam.My favourist are music and cooking .Good happy to every one

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maimai said:

Hello every body !I'm new member here.I"m 20 years old, I'm female from Viet Nam.My favourist are music and cooking .Good happy to every one

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fail

bio-chem said:

i worked for 15 dollars an hour as a laborer in a nuclear power plant. probably some of the worst conditions I can think of personally. it helped pay for college and I think it was damn good money. their are plenty of US citizens willing to accept lower wages if that is all they can get. remember, unemployment is up. and those citizens making 9 or 10 dollars an hour are going to want goods/services. an investment in infrastructure helps everyone. better roads=safer/faster travel for goods and services. think of how many goods are transported by semi truck here in the US. i'll give obama the benefit of the doubt.

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I work elbows deep in some of the harshest chemicals every day. Antique restoration is some nasty fucking work. Over half of the chemicals I work with have warnings on the label about causing cancer.

When I'm not slopping in chemicals, I am loading and moving some of the heaviest furniture around. It all takes its toll.

But I like what I do. The work is interesting, and it is the first time in my life that I can say that what I do is an art. I did it for $10.00 an hour to put myself through school, and over the coarse of 5 years I worked my way up to $16.00 an hour.

Little Wing said:

i live in Maine it's 40 below 0 here. makes it easy to be sympathetic to people i see around the shelters. i think a lot of them are dealing with mental issues, none of them seem "normal". i think in a lot of cases it's maybe more complicated than they just won't work especially the teens.

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i agree. most of the time it is a mental issue. this is a problem that people need to address. not the government. people. you and me giving of our time and money to organizations to help. that is the most effective IMHO

KelJu said:

I work elbows deep in some of the harshest chemicals every day. Antique restoration is some nasty fucking work. Over half of the chemicals I work with have warnings on the label about causing cancer.

When I'm not slopping in chemicals, I am loading and moving some of the heaviest furniture around. It all takes its toll.

But I like what I do. The work is interesting, and it is the first time in my life that I can say that what I do is an art. I did it for $10.00 an hour to put myself through school, and over the coarse of 5 years I worked my way up to $16.00 an hour.

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BoneCrusher said:

Okay so who do they hire to build those roads? Any of us speak spanglish? If so we can work for $9hr, or less, and build bridges.

You, each and every one of y0ou reading this post, needs at least $18hr to get out of bed. If it involves actual work, like saaaaay swinging from a back harness and setting columnation forming at some 100 feet off the ground you might want tad bit more. The messican will happily swing out there and do that yob for $9hr no problem.

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and for around 40k a year starting, you can be part of an organization who keeps the mexicans, who are immigrating into our country illegally, out of our country...