Rossputin.com Rational Thinking About Our World

I reported a couple of weeks ago on an AP story describing how errors or lies are massively inflating the “jobs created or saved” number touted by the Administration as a sign of the effectiveness of the so-called “stimulus". In that note, I pointed out that when as pro-Obama an organization as the AP is critical of the Administration, the offense must be grievous indeed.

If there is any publication to the left of the AP, it’s the Boston Globe.  And it’s that very Boston Globe which had a lead web site article on Wednesday entitled “Stimulus job boost in state exaggerated, review finds.“

The first sentence of the article, from the normally pro-Obama paper, reads: “While Massachusetts recipients of federal stimulus money collectively report 12,374 jobs saved or created, a Globe review shows that number is wildly exaggerated. Organizations that received stimulus money miscounted jobs, filed erroneous figures, or claimed jobs for work that has not yet started.”

The stories are becoming common-place: Private companies don’t understand the report filing instructions (and I actually believe that’s frequently true). Some recipients of taxpayer money are reclassifying money that wasn’t “stimulus” money as if it did come from the stimulus, giving credit where none is due. And government agencies are likely overstating the stimulus-related jobs intentionally. After all, even if a government agency is not dominated by pro-Obama people, it’s still likely to be dominated by people who believe in big government and who want citizens to believe that their tax money isn’t wasted (though most of us know better.)

As Glenn Beck has been saying lately, we’re seeing “scattered showers of journalism” appearing. Now we’re just waiting for the downpour…but I have rather little confidence in its impending arrival.