To argue that the dysfunction of the federal government is purely a Republican issue would be naïve. Long unable to move forward on Democratic legislation, the new Congressional majority of 2009 was quick to let loose and take advantage of a Democratic executive branch.

The ARRA was the first significant legislation to wear the stamp of a Congress controlled by Democrats. Although it has been successful, in spite of Republican spin, one has to wonder how effective it might have been if more keenly honed to address directly the specific issue of job creation. It’s true that it included $288 billion in tax relief that cut the tax bills of 95% of Americans, and that it also sent $224 billion to aid the states and pin up Medicaid and unemployment insurance. But the $275 billion that went to direct investment was not, like the other portions, intended to sustain current spending and break the fall. It was allocated for the express purpose of creating jobs.

It is within this direct investment component of the stimulus that the Democrats established their most resounding successes, but unfortunately it also exhibits their most disappointing failures. There’s little room for legitimate complaint about the $90 billion allocated for clean energy or the $20 billion that will fund the digitizing of medical records. Both of these programs will pay dividends to American taxpayers far into the future. But the vast sum of grant money distributed into the black hole of government gives cause for concern and lends substance to the Republican argument that Democrats are all about bigger government.

Though the data is not coded to ease such extraction, a brief analysis of the information provided for download at http://www.recovery.gov/ reveals some interesting facts. The data representing all allocations through the end of June includes 347,915 awards of contracts, grants and loans, totaling $237 billion. Interestingly, a query of the data looking for “recipients” with a name that includes “school” or “education” finds 59,916 awards totaling $47 billion. Similarly, a search of “college” or “university” nets 26,047 awards for nearly $17 billion. Looking for funding that went to cities, a query of “city of” returns 16,364 award and another $17 billion; counties apparently received on the order of $12 billion, state departments of transportation around $19 billion, and other state departments and housing authorities close to $20 billion more.

All told, on the order of $131 billion appears to have gone to government organizations. This is not to say that none of this funding found its way into the private sector, or that thousands of private sector jobs were not created. Many of these government agencies, from school districts to transportation departments, maintain a practice of subcontracting to industry vendors. But once the money is fed into the bureaucratic machine, suspicion arises, and rightfully so. Such practice is viewed as more SNAFU (Situation Normal All Fouled Up) because accountability and transparency are severely obscured. The result is that both the motivation and effectiveness of the investments is appropriately called into question.

Fortunately for Republicans, not long after the Stimulus, the Democrats lost their filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. From that point on, steadfast Republican obstruction has reigned supreme over timid Democratic initiative. As stated above, the Republicans, without doubt, deserve their share of the blame in this, but if not for the Democrat’s extreme lack of intestinal fortitude, much more meaningful legislation could have been passed. From healthcare to finance reform, the Democrats have allowed themselves to be bullied, never once requiring the filibustering Republicans to actually stand up and control the floor of the Senate. Instead, each time they compromised and produced diluted legislation of questionable worth.

In the end, the most well defined accomplishment of our near completely dysfunctional Congress is a starkly polarized populace. Americans on both sides of the debate blame the other. The Tea Party blindly carries the banner of smaller government and continues to grow in its numbers, railing against an ineffective government but upholding positions that only promise to make it more so. When will we learn?

Government is not the enemy, but the sorry excuse in Washington sure is. The solutions are before us, but the path we’ve chosen, through two political parties that fight harder for control than for the wellbeing of the nation is leading us to destruction. The American people need to wake up, to refuse to listen to anymore political rhetoric and to start asking more intelligent questions. America doesn’t need smaller government, nor does it need larger — it needs effective government, and it needs it now.

Americans complain about the federal government’s failure to restore the economy, and they largely place the blame on the Democrats because they are in power. But while the Democrats have their share of culpability, the Republicans have earned their title as the “Party of No.”

Ironically, the party whose members claim unwavering dedication to the original spirit of the Constitution has relied upon a parliamentary maneuver that was not part of the Framers plan and used it to obstruct the process of government. The filibuster, which did not exist at all until 1837 and did not require a super-majority to break before 1917, has become a prominent feature of the obstructionist Republican minority.

The filibuster was used sparingly up until 1970. Between 1919 and 1960 there had been only 27 filings of cloture (motion to end a filibuster). But in recent times it has grown in popularity, with the Republican minority of the past two congresses setting all-time records. Prior to the 110^th Congress (2007-08), the Democratic minority had held the record with 68 filings in 2005-06. The last two Republican minorities eclipsed that total by stopping the wheels of government 139 times in 2007-08 and already 118 times in the current Congress.

This is obstructionism, plain and simple. Our democracy is based on political deliberation and debate that culminates in a vote, and the Republicans have strived to stop this process from occurring. They have essentially fought to block anything and everything the Democrats have proposed and offered nothing in the way of alternatives. So egregious is their barricade of democracy that they have no defense against charges of deliberate sabotage at the expense of American citizens.

The Republicans blocked healthcare, and they stood in opposition to Wall Street reform. They opposed job aid to the states, and they fought against extending unemployment benefits. They filibustered small business stimulus and attempted to stop the closing of loopholes to disrupt the offshoring of jobs. The Republicans have even repeatedly resorted to filibustering President Obama’s appointments, adding greatly to their excessive number of holds, which have led to fewer than half of the President’s judicial appointments being confirmed. The inescapable truth is that the party that wants people to believe that government is ineffective has done everything within their power to make it so.

Yet as counterproductive as this “just say no” tactic has been inside the Congress, the distortion and spin so prevalent in the media has been even more destructive. Witness the Stimulus: routinely portrayed as an abysmal failure by Republicans, non-partisan experts credit it with adding as much as 4.5% to the GDP and trimming 2 full percentage points from unemployment. In fact, as stated by economist Mark Zandi of Moody’s, it just happens that the month the NBER identified as the end of the recession was the month in which Stimulus spending was at it’s maximum.

Interestingly, it was also June of 2009 when former House Speaker, Newt Gingrich told the crowd at a Republican fundraising event that the Stimulus had “already failed.” His claim was obviously untrue, but when the objective is strictly confined to discrediting the opposing party, regardless of the costs to the American people, the rules of honesty and common decency have no bearing. From Sarah Palin to John Boehner, Mitch McConnell to John McCain, the Republicans have set aside any semblance of sincerity in order to mask their commitment to the wealthy and regain power on the backs of a struggling middle class.

Next: Broken Government — Democratic Inadequacy

Article first published as Obama Takes a $50 Billion Infrastructure Punch at the GOP on Technorati.

Speaking at a Labor Day rally in Wisconsin yesterday, President Obama announced a new $50 billion infrastructure spending plan. Of the new initiative, the President told the crowd of union workers that, “This will not only create jobs immediately, but will make our economy run better over the long haul.” He also warned that, “If we are going to get anything done, Republican cooperation, which has been all but non-existent recently, will be necessary.” Can it be that the President actually believes he can get Republican support? The pragmatic answer would have to be, not unless he’s lost his mind. So, assuming that President Obama is still in control of his mental faculties, why present this new initiative?

The obvious answer is “politics.” The President’s speech was not confined to the new infrastructure spending plan. He also used the opportunity to fire a salvo at the Republicans in Congress and set the stage for the Democratic argument for the final two months of campaign 2010. Not only did the President contrast the need for Republican support against their consistent record of obstructionism, but he also made the case that should the Republicans be returned to power, they will attempt to revive the very same agenda that created the crisis in the first place.

“They’re betting that between now and November, you’ll come down with amnesia,” said the President. “They think you’re going to forget what their agenda did to this country,” he continued. He’s right, of course, but then the odds appear to be firmly in the Republican’s favor, and their bet anything but a long shot. The people have already forgotten — haven’t they? Why else would they support the Republicans?

It’s good that President Obama is finally taking some initiative to help frame the debate, but he’s come to the party so late that most people have already made up their minds. Where was the President while the Republicans thoroughly polluted the well with their fact-free propaganda? The best that can be hoped for at this juncture is that a newly invigorated debate that contrasts Democratic substance with nauseating Republican hypocrisy will motivate Democrats to get out and vote. But with little else left in their bag of tactics, this is likely a good choice, although as stark as the contrast may be, one must question whether or not anyone’s still listening.

Democrats have been too silent for too long, allowing Republicans to spin some whoppers into commonly accepted truisms. Distorted perceptions are so keenly ingrained at this point that the Obama administration doesn’t even want to associate their infrastructure initiative with the word “stimulus” — this in spite of the fact that, according to all objective measures, the Stimulus has been extremely effective. It’s created as many as 3.3 million jobs and added as much as 4.5% to the GDP, yet President Obama continues to avoid singing its praise, thereby opening his flank to further GOP sniping. But regardless, the non-stimulus infrastructure initiative should provide an excellent opportunity for Democrats to bring core party differences to the forefront.

No sooner had the President announced the infrastructure plan when congressional Republicans started their predictable rhetoric. Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell was quick to color the proposed bill as having “more than $50 billion in new tax hikes.” Of course, he was referring to the fact that the infrastructure spending that would rebuild or restore 150,000 miles of roads, add 4,000 miles of railway, target improvements to the U.S. air traffic control system and create an “Infrastructure Bank” to coordinate funding and planning of projects would all be fully funded, without impact on the deficit, by ending various tax breaks for oil and gas companies. Like the Democrat’s plan to fund aid for teachers and firefighters by ending tax loopholes that encouraged corporations to ship jobs overseas, McConnell and his cronies are against anything that might reduce corporate profits.

Never wanting to be left out, the man who wants to be Speaker of the House, John Boehner, was also quick in his criticism of the plan. “As the American people, facing near double-digit unemployment, mark Labor Day by asking, where are the jobs, the White House has chosen to double-down on more of the same failed ‘stimulus’ spending,” said Boehner in a prepared statement. Long a champion of the wealthy, Boehner failed to mention how his ongoing commitment to self-interest has consistently driven his obstruction of anything and everything that could help jobs. Yet, the man who called the healthcare legislation “Armageddon,” who feigns concern over the deficit yet supports tax cuts for the rich, who supports small business but fights against small business aid, who ignores every statistic on the Stimulus and paints public employees as “special interests,” wants everyone to believe that he has a plan to, “create jobs by eliminating the job-killing uncertainty that is hampering our small businesses.”

The fact of the matter is that Congressman Boehner is the creator-in-chief of the “job-killing uncertainty” he so often calls to mind. He and his Senate counterpart, Mitch McConnell are stuffed so deep into the pockets of Big-Business that they’ve lost sight of their moral compasses. Together, they are the wingmen of a Republican party whose plan to create jobs consists of a “Roadmap for America’s Future” that promises to cut into Social Security and Medicare in order to fund more tax cuts for the rich. Just how a tax cut that would provide 117% of its relief to the top 1%, while increasing taxes on the bottom 95%, will help create jobs has yet to be explained. But this is just SOP for the GOP — the fiction and friction party.

Obama started a new conversation yesterday. He took off the kid gloves and put on the boxing gloves. He fired a few combinations, mixed it up with some body blows, and showed the Republicans for whom they truly are. The Republicans responded with some blind flailing and cover up. Round 1 goes to Obama, but the fight has just begun. Fortunately for Democrats, if called on the facts, the Republican’s defense is wafer thin. If the President continues to press, he will easily reveal their complete lack of substance. Let’s hope that President Obama fights to the finish. America needs a champion for all Americans.