$600 million spent to influence health care debate

Health care reform has turned into the costliest single legislative issue yet. More than $600 million has been spent on lobbying, campaign contributions and TV ads.

WASHINGTON (CNNMoney.com) -- The price tag to influence the health care debate in the halls of Congress has surpassed $600 million and is fast becoming a legislative record breaker.

Reaching beyond the half-billion mark, the total spent on lobbyists, television ads and political donations is enough to pay the insurance tab for about 45,000 families a year.

A third of that spending, $200 million, was raised and spent just in the past few months, as Congress has been more thoroughly ensconced in policy debates about public insurance options and taxpayer-funded abortions.

Senate Democrats are expected to unveil their official health care bill as soon as Wednesday, and debate it in December and vote by the year's end.

The big spenders range from drug companies, hospitals and doctor groups to organizations that advocate for unions, immigrants and retirees.

Lobbying: Lobbying continues to account for the largest chunk, with health care industry spending just shy of $400 million through Oct. 26, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

"The health sector is on pace to spend more money than it ever has before," Dave Levinthal of the Center for Responsive Politics, which analyzes and collects lobbying and campaign spending figures. "Its spending obliterates its totals from previous years."

Health industry executives say that their spending is necessary, given what's at stake. It's also guaranteed by the Constitution.

"We're reforming one-sixth of the economy with an issue that effects every individual and employer across the country," said Robert Zirkelbach, spokesman for America's Health Insurance Plans, a group fighting against a public insurance option. "Sometimes that point gets missed in this debate."

Lobbying by drug companies accounted for nearly half of all health sector lobbying. Among other issues, the pharmaceutical industry is keen on making sure that the government doesn't start allowing imports of cheaper prescriptions from Canada or Mexico.

"We are doing everything possible to make comprehensive health care reform a reality this year," said Ken Johnson, senior vice president of the trade group PhRMA. "It will benefit patients, the economy and the future of our nation. There's a lot at stake right now."

The lobbying figure doesn't include lobbying by the Chamber of Commerce ($65 million) or AARP ($15 million), groups that have lobbied on health care, as well as other bills, including financial regulatory reform.

Other heavy hitters among health sector lobbying include hospitals and nursing homes ($77 million) and doctors and other health professionals ($59 million).

Television advertising: Spending on TV ads by health care interests is the next major record-breaking category - topping $165.7 million through Monday, according to the Campaign Media Analysis Group.

"This is far and away the most we've seen spent," said said Evan Tracey, president of the the media research group, which also consults for CNN. "There's certainly no comparison that comes right to mind."

Over the past month, opponents have spent $23 million in ads opposing health care reform while supporters have spent $11 million.

TV ads had been more focused on policy issues, such as calls for insurance coverage for tests that detect autism. But now ads are starting to transition into focusing on politics, with attacks on lawmakers who vote for or against health care reform. That means even more will be spent in coming months, as ads begin running in media markets with competitive congressional races, Tracey said.

Campaign contributions: Political donations are also on the rise.

Health care professionals and companies have plunked down $38 million to fund 2010 candidates for federal office, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Some $95 million was raised during the 2008 cycle.

Top spending sectors include health professionals ($13 million), drug makers ($5 million) and hospitals and nursing homes ($4 million). Top recipients were Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C.

-CNN's Ted Barrett contributed to this report

LINK TO VIDEO

http://money.cnn.com/video/news/2009/10/15/n_healthcare_lobby.cnnmoney

Lou Dobbs: My downfall at CNN started when Barack Obama became President

 Willens/APLou Dobbs talks to Bill O'Reilly on

Former CNN veteran Lou Dobbs suggests his form of advocacy journalism fell out of favor when President Obama was elected and his ratings began to decline.

Dobbs, who had come under fire from watchdog groups because of his on-air, anti-immigration stance, told Bill O'Reilly Monday on the Fox News Channel that he never heard directly from CNN management that he made the network look bad - but there was a tonal change when Obama became President.

"You know, I discern more of a difference between then, which was under the Bush administration whom I was criticizing, and now, when it is the Obama administration and an entirely different tone was taken," Dobbs said.

Dobbs abruptly resigned from CNN last week after agreeing that he could no longer operate under CNN's push to avoid airing anchor opinions in prime time.

As for the future, Dobbs reiterated he's going to take his time. " I'm going to remain - I can guarantee you 100 percent - I'm going to remain in the in the public arena," Dobbs said.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv/2009/11/17/2009-11-17_lou_dobbs_my_downfall_at_cnn_started_when_barack_obama_became_president.html#ixzz0XDE7OTT3

Saturday, Nov. 14, 2009 

Man with $600 on him arrested for allegedly stealing pencil

Gun-Toting Homeowner Catches Burglar In His Boxers

Intruder Made Himself At Home: Showering, Doing Laundry, Filling The Fridge

GOLDEN, Colo. -- A Golden homeowner did a double-take when he caught a burglar at gunpoint in his house.

The intruder, who had more than made himself at home, was only wearing a pair of boxers -- boxers belonging to the homeowner. The man had also showered, done his laundry, and placed his own items in the refrigerator, Golden police said.

David Strickland told 7 News that he returned home at 5 p.m. last Monday to find a stranger's white Lexus ES300 in his garage. Inside, there were signs that someone had been rummaging through his house.

"What was going through my mind is 'I cannot believe what's going on here,'" said Strickland.

As he searched the house, the homeowner called out, demanding to know who was there.

"To his surprise, a male voice answered," a Golden police report said.

He looked upstairs and saw a man calmly standing there wearing only a pair of boxers, belonging to the homeowner.

When Strickland demanded that the boxer burglar get off his property, he said, the man claimed he was the real homeowner and that the gun was a toy.

Strickland said that he fired a warning shot at the door when the suspect moved towards him aggressively.

Police soon arrived at the home in the 1200 block of Mesa Court and arrested 24-year old Timothy P. Gonzales of Golden.

Not only had the suspect spent most of the day in the home, he had pretended to be the homeowner when two real estate agents and their clients arrived for a showing of the house, which is for sale, police said.

Officers also discovered materials commonly used to make methamphetamine on the work bench in the garage.

Gonzales was booked into the Jefferson County jail for burglary, possession of burglary tools and drug violations. The Jefferson County District Attorney's office will consider further charges.

"Bottom line, I'm just glad nobody got hurt," said Strickland.

He said if he had it to do again, he would have walked out the back door, but he was glad he knew how to use his gun appropriately.

"If you're going to keep a gun for home protection, you need to know what you're going to do and what you're not going to do, just for safety's sake," Strickland said.

Gonzales has a long criminal record, including charges of trespassing, possession of burglar tools and drug offenses.

Golden police said they are investigating how and why Gonzales broke into the home.

There are no signs of forced entry.

If he used the realtor's lock box to get in, police said they will be investigating how he got the access code and whether there are similar crimes in other cities. 

LINK TO VIDEO

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/21632230/detail.html

Town Police Chief Charged With Selling Guns

Man Was Former Baltimore City Police Officer

POSTED: 5:55 pm EST November 17, 2009
UPDATED: 6:00 pm EST November 17, 2009

BALTIMORE -- A former Baltimore city police officer who became a police chief in a small Maryland town is currently under indictment, and many are trying to understand how the man they hired is accused of breaking the law.

Oakland Army mom refused to go to Afghanistan because of son

Chris Metinko
Oakland Tribune

Posted: 11/13/2009 08:05:55 PM PST

Updated: 11/16/2009 06:53:31 AM PST
   

 

Army Spc. Alexis Hutchinson and son Kamani Hutchinson.

 A 21-year-old Army specialist from Oakland who skipped out on her deployment date to Afghanistan has been ordered to remain on her base in Georgia for a review of "alleged misconduct," while her civilian attorney contends the soldier had no choice, with nowhere to keep her young baby.

Alexis Hutchinson was expected to deploy to Afghanistan with the rest of her unit Nov. 5. However, according to her attorney, Rai Sue Sussman, after plans to place her 10-month-old son, Kamani, fell through, the Army insisted she still deploy.

Hutchinson, who joined the Army in 2007, was stationed at Hunter Army Airfield in Georgia in early 2008 and gave birth in January.

Just before her scheduled deployment, she went AWOL for less than 24 hours and returned voluntarily, her lawyer said.

"The day before she was forced to deploy, they told her you have a choice to make, but your duty is to get on that plane," Sussman said. "She didn't have anyone to take care of her child. She thought they'd put her on a plane and take her child away."

Sussman said Hutchinson had intended to leave her son with her mother, Angelique Hughes, in Oakland. However, her mother soon realized she was unable to take care of Kamani, while also taking care of her special-needs daughter, her ailing mother and her ailing sister.

In late October, Sussman said the Army told Hutchinson they would give her more time to find suitable arrangements for her child, but then earlier  this month told her she would not get the extended time after all and would have to deploy.

LINK

http://www.insidebayarea.com/oaklandtribune/localnews/ci_13785127?source=rss

Sussman said when Hutchinson returned to the airfield she was arrested by the military Nov. 6, and the Army placed her son in child protective services. However, Hutchinson's mother has since flown to Georgia to pick up Kamani and has brought him back to Oakland.

Sussman said Hutchinson currently is confined to the airfield in Georgia, and faces up to a year in jail. However, an Army spokesman denied Hutchinson is under any confinement and has instead been ordered to stay on the installation until her commander can review her situation.

"Just days prior to her scheduled deployment, Specialist Hutchinson's commander received information that indicated that Specialist Hutchinson had engaged in misconduct," Fort Stewart and Hunter Army Airfield spokesman Kevin Larson said in a statement. "Due to the fact that Specialist Hutchinson has a small child, her deployment was delayed so that the command could ensure Specialist Hutchinson's child was cared for and so that she could meet with legal counsel."

Larson added Hutchinson's commander is reexamining whether or not she will be able to deploy because her case could present a hardship.

In a release put out by Sussman, Hutchinson is quoted as saying: "It is outrageous that they would deploy a single mother without a complete and current family care plan. I would like to find someone I trust who can take care of my son, but I cannot force my family to do this. They are dealing with their own health issues."

Hutchinson is not a conscientious objector seeking to avoid deployment, her lawyer said.

Police: Man Upset Over Ticket Phoned Trooper's Mom

CARLE PLACE, N.Y. (CBS)

 

Police say a Long Island man upset about a speeding ticket tried to get even with a state trooper by making a prank phone call to his mother.

Authorities say Lawrence Demaio, of Carle Place, called the woman about a month after the ticket was issued and told her her son had been badly hurt in a car accident.

Police didn't think it was funny. They used phone records to trace the call to Demaio's cell phone.

The 54-year-old was arrested Thursday and charged with second-degree aggravated harassment.

The phone at Demaio's home rang unanswered Saturday.

Women need to watch their drinks -- and their drinking

 Alaska Daily News

November 15, 2009 - 9:16 pm

The rumors were everywhere. On Facebook. On Craigslist. At the coffee shop. Young women were being drugged at downtown bars. Someone was slipping them "date rape drugs," like the sedative Rohypnol or party drug GHB. They weren't being sexually assaulted. But someone was making them sick. It seemed like the stuff of urban legend.

A 26-year-old student e-mailed to say she had been drugged in the fall. She said she went out with six friends. They split three pitchers of beer. All her friends left except for one. She ordered another drink before heading to the dance floor. A little later, she started to feel sick. She told her friend they needed to go home. The last thing she remembers is walking down the sidewalk on Fourth Avenue.

"I woke up on my neighbor's couch, covered in vomit with a busted lip," she said over the telephone.

She was groggy. She didn't remember how she got home. Her friend said she went from tipsy to wasted in a matter of minutes. Wasn't she just really drunk? She said no.

"It's completely different," she told me.

Another e-mail came from a 24-year-old woman who said she had been drugged in May. Over the course of an evening, she had five drinks and a tequila shot. Then she collapsed in a bathroom.

"I lost complete control over all my limbs and couldn't walk. Both my friends, who are a few inches shorter than I, were carrying my not-so-small frame for more than 10 blocks till we landed at a friend's place downtown," she wrote. "The memory flashbacks of that night are of me lying there, thinking, 'Oh, I can't really move or talk.' "

She said she knew her tolerance for alcohol and she hadn't had too much. Something felt different. Possibly, but I wondered: who hasn't underestimated the effects of alcohol? Especially when it comes to that last tequila shot. Especially in your 20s, after a night of drinking.

One of the women put an ad on Craigs-list asking if other people had been drugged. She said she had more than a dozen responses. And I kept hearing rumors. Young women told me about having a number of drinks over nights out downtown. They described loss of control over their limbs. Unexpected intoxication. Seeing double. Passing out. The next morning, splitting headaches and fatigue. They knew their tolerance, and it seemed out of the ordinary, they said.

But if someone was drugging women, what was the motive? None of them had been sexually assaulted. All of them were out with friends, not in date situations. Most of them had more than a few drinks before getting sick. Was there really some late night bar patron slipping women drugs just for kicks? Maybe there were assaults I hadn't heard about.

Jennifer Meyer, supervisor for forensic nursing services at Providence Alaska Medical Center, is in charge of a staff of nurses who collect evidence in sexual assault cases. I asked if she'd seen more cases lately where a stranger had slipped something in a drink. She said no.

Most of the time sexual assault victims know their attacker, she said. Alcohol alone is a far bigger factor in sexual assaults than drugged drinks, she said. She estimated that of the assaults she'd helped investigate, about 20 percent of victims suspected they were drugged. But that didn't mean all of them had been, she said.

"Alcohol, if you have enough of it, certainly mimics the date-rape drugs," she said.

Often it's hard to tell what happened, she said. Drugs metabolize quickly. By the time women wake up and report the assault, it can be too late to test.

"It happens, it's a known situation," she told me. "It's just extremely difficult to prove."

Sgt. Ken McCoy, supervisor of the special victims unit at the Anchorage Police Department told me he has seen very little evidence of sexual assaults involving date-rape drugs. For a few years they tested every rape victim, but had no positive results, except for one woman who said she took the drugs, he said.

"We have victims who present to us all the time they believe that was a factor," he said. "In a large majority of our cases, it appears that alcohol was the overwhelming factor."

If someone suspects their friend has been drugged at a bar, they should get them to the hospital and get tested right away, he said. They should also call the police.

John Pattee, the head of the Anchorage Cabaret, Hotel, Restaurant, Retailer's Association, owns The Gaslight and The Avenue bars and has been in the industry for more than 20 years. The rumors concerned him. He planned to ask his staff to keep an eye out for people messing with women's drinks. He told me he has heard about women being drugged from time to time, but it has never been substantiated.

"I believe it's happened. Absolutely," he said. "Just how often does it happen? I don't know."

In some cases, he said, it appeared women had been drinking too much and thought they were drugged. Or they felt embarrassed after a night of heavy drinking and didn't want to take responsibility. Maybe they were young and they blacked out for the first time so it felt like something out of the ordinary happened.

It was hard to say for sure what was going on. I believed the women when they said they felt different than usual. But for each of them, there was plenty of alcohol involved. It seemed, at least in some cases, the drinks were the most logical culprit.

Then I heard from a woman in her late 30s who said she thought she was drugged in January. She'd been at a work function with a friend. She estimated she had four or five drinks over the course of the evening, and then around midnight went to a bar downtown. She and the friend stayed until the bar closed, and she had three more drinks. When she was signing the tab, she said, she felt strange.

By the time she made it into a cab, she was "really out of it," she said. She knew the cab driver. She'd met him at a bar a few weeks before. He'd asked her for her number, and she'd given it to him. He dropped off her friend. When she got home, he helped her out of the cab, she said. Then, she said, he followed her in and assaulted her.

"When he started doing things to me I couldn't sit up. I couldn't even reach him to try and push him away," she said. "I could not get back up."

Soon she blacked out, she said. She woke up several hours later because she was vomiting. She felt groggy and embarrassed. She didn't immediately go to police. She washed her sheets. She took a shower. Her case went cold, she said, because of lack of forensic evidence. Did she think her attacker drugged her? She didn't know. Maybe it was someone else. What she did know: He was looking for a woman who was vulnerable.

I thought about that. Nothing any woman does means she asked to be assaulted. All the talk about slipping things in drinks obscures a larger issue: Just drinking more than a couple beers in a downtown bar is risky for women. It shouldn't be that way, but it is. It's easy to forget how vulnerable we can become.

When we aren't aware of our surroundings, when we're obviously intoxicated, we become targets. That happens all the time, usually not because of a mystery drugger, but because of alcohol. For most of us, alcohol intake is something we can control.

We should all keep an eye on our drinks. We shouldn't leave them when we go out to smoke or head to the dance floor. It's possible someone could slip us something.

But in a world where men still regularly prey on women, what is most likely to keep us safe is keeping an eye on how much we drink in the first place.

http://www.wbaltv.com/video/21625846/

Police: Repo Man Struck By Repossessed Car

Lance Barry
Last Update: 9:38 pm

Clayton County News

7:01 p.m. Monday, November 16, 2009 

Clayton teacher charged with putting "hit" on student

Clayton County schools are investigating charges a teacher threatened a student after questioning the teen's sexuality.

Clayton County Sheriff’s Office Clayton County teacher Randolph Forde was arrested on charges of terroristic threats. He is accused of threatening a 16-year-old student.

Jail records show Forde was arrested last month of charges of terrorist threats and released on a $10,000 bond. Forde is scheduled to attend an employment hearing on Tuesday on possible disciplinary action.

According to the student's attorney, Forde pulled the 16-year-old student out of class and asked him if he was gay.

"A child’s sexuality is never a teacher’s business," said Marcia Killebrew, the student's mother. "I feel like the man was being extremely inappropriate."

The next day,  the teacher got into a verbal altercation in an algebra class, said Terance Madden, the student's attorney.

“The teacher threatened to hit him in his ‘f-ing mouth,’” Madden said.

A few days later, Forde asked another student to “put a hit” on the teenager, according to a police report.

"The suspect advised to the witness that he would pay him to kill the victim," the report states.

The teacher wrote the victim's name on a note and showed it to another student on the school bus, the report says.

“I have no idea why teacher would want to hurt my son," Killebrew said. "But all it came after the teachers asked my son if he was gay. For the teacher to ask that, he had to have a motive. That’s not a random question."

Forde told police he "had no interaction with the witness or the victim, and he never made a statement regarding the victim," according to the report.

Forde's attorney, Borquaye Thomas, said the 16-year-old only complained after he got in trouble for another incident.

"The allegation is he made a hit on him, but that was not what was said nor what was intended," Thomas said. "The student only complained after he was getting suspended."

Forde asked the student about being gay after he saw the boy dancing inappropriately with another male student in class, Thomas said.

"All of the students knew Mr. Forde was joking," Thomas said. "The other students said Mr. Forde always plays around with them like that."

Killebrew, the targeted  student's  mother, contacted Clayton County police, who presented the allegations to a magistrate judge. A judge issued an arrest warrant on Oct. 13, according to court records.

The teacher has since been released from jail, but was ordered to stay away from the student.

Killebrew said she took her son out of school for seven days. He returned to class following the arrest.

"He’s really scared. He’s at the point where he trusted the authorities at school and now he is real untrusting," she said.

Forde waived a preliminary hearing and is waiting for the case to be sent to a grand jury, Madden said.

Forde has been teaching in Clayton since August 2008, White said. He will remain on administrative leave while school officials conduct an investigation.

“We have received a report that allegations were lodged against the teacher by the student’s parent,” White said.

The teacher's attorney said an internal review by the school system recommends he be suspended without pay for five days and attend training for "inappropriate and unprofessional" interaction with a student. However, the school's review could not corroborate that Forde put a hit on the teenager, Thomas said.

Killebrew said she will ask the school board on Tuesday to terminate Forde, not just suspend him.

Forde is a special education teacher, according to the schools’ website.

Members of the 8th Canadian Hussars lower the coffin carrying the remains of Gladys Winifred Fowler in Hammondvale, N.B. on Sunday. (ANDREW VAUGHN/The Canadian Press)

HAMMONDVALE, N.B. - More than 90 years after she died and her remains were inexplicably forgotten in storage in a London catacomb, Gladys Fowler is finally home in Canada.

On Sunday, during a service on a hillside in Hammondvale, N.B., Fowler was laid to rest in a grave where relatives believed she had been all along.

"It's a sad day because a young girl has died, and a young girl has died very far from home, and didn't return until this day," said Fowler's niece, Jane Fowler Morse.

Fowler died on April 17, 1917 at the age of 18 at the Berners Hotel in London.

She was the daughter of then-New Brunswick MP George Fowler, at the time a lieutenant-colonel serving with the 13th Canadian Reserve Battalion during the final months of the First World War.

A death certificate lists her cause of death as a combination of heart disease and illness.

Her coffin was placed in a packing crate and stored in a huge catacomb beneath the Anglican Chapel at Kensal Green Cemetery - apparently for later transport to Canada - but that didn't happen until now.

Even now, Morse said no one knows why her aunt was left behind.

"Our grandfather did suffer financial losses in a big fire in Sussex in the early 1920s and he was ill when he came back from the war and he died in 1924, so whether those interfered, or something else, it's hard to say."

Barry Smith of the Friends of Kensal Green Cemetery traced her story after cemetery officials decided to open the mysterious packing crate that had been left among the 2,500 coffins that inhabit the catacomb.

Inside they discovered the coffin bearing a plaque with Fowler's name engraved.

That led Smith to trace the death certificate and begin a search for family members in an effort to solve the mystery.

Morse, of Geneseo, N.Y., came forward after hearing the story.

She said her father, Cedric, often spoke fondly of his sister, but never mentioned that she wasn't buried in the family plot, despite the fact that her name was engraved on the large granite headstone there.

Fowler's father died in 1924 and her mother died in 1936, while a brother named Eric died at the age of 30 in 1930.

Morse's father died in the United States where he had emigrated, and his body was donated to science.

"A wound was closed for our family today, and I'm certainly grateful for that," said Morse's brother John Fowler of Wrightstown, Penn.

Eight members of the 8th Canadian Hussars strained under the weight of the lead-lined coffin as they carried it up a wet, grassy hill to the grave site.

A few dozen members of the rural community stood in the pouring rain to attend the service and show their support for the Fowler family.

"The family has always been well thought of," said Ruth Floyd.

"Gladys's father donated this land for the cemetery, and the land for the church and the school."

Following the service Fowler and Morse thanked the many people for the outpouring of donations that resulted in their aunt's final trek home.

Those donations included the flight by Air Canada and services of the Wallace Funeral Home in Sussex, N.B.

"I'm humbled by the Canadian people and the outpouring of support," Fowler said as he choked back tears. "It makes us proud to have Canadian roots."

Fowler and Morse made a special point to thank Barry Smith who began the search into Gladys's story, and made the trip to Canada to escort the remains to their final resting place.

"We gave her back her nationality and her identity and now we're pleased to give her back to her family," Smith said.

It has been a story Smith has been involved with for more than two years, and he was philosophical when asked about it coming to an end.

"It's a story of two parts," he said, "one, the inhumanity that caused Gladys to be in London, and the second part 92 years later is the generosity and humanity of so many people to bring her home."

Chefs hold up a "passion dessert" at the annual gastronomy fair in Bogota, Friday, Nov. 13, 2009. The dessert's ingredients include passion fruit and the active ingredient in viagra, according to one of the dessert's creators Juan Sebastian Gomez. (THE ASSOCIATED PRESS/William Fernando Martinez)

BOGOTA, Colombia - A Colombian cooking school has concocted a "love dessert" made with passion fruit - and Viagra.

Student chefs at the state culinary school in Quindio province wouldn't give the complete ingredients but say it contains the active ingredient in Viagra. The pudding-like dessert is garnished with whipped cream and chocolate, and served in a parfait glass.

Sebastian Gomez, one of the creators, says the idea was to reinterpret the blue pill into a new kind of aphrodisiac.

Gomez said the recipe describes how much Viagra to safely dissolve into the dessert.

The dessert is, of course, not for sale as Viagra is a prescription drug.

The students presented the dessert at "Gastronomy 2009" show in Bogota

Nov. 15, 2009

FREE PRESS SPECIAL REPORT

Billions for state, but where are jobs?

Majority of stimulus awards have brought little help

WASHINGTON -- Seven months into the massive federal stimulus program, the vast majority of government grants, contracts and loans in Michigan so far have created or retained virtually no jobs, a Free Press analysis shows.

The analysis also revealed that others who have been promised or have received stimulus money have overstated -- in some cases greatly -- the number of jobs created or protected.

Obama administration and state officials say it's too early to draw conclusions about the overall impact of the $787-billion nationwide program to stimulate the economy and generate jobs. They promise that job growth will follow as more funding arrives.

"It looks to us like the program is unfolding much as we hoped in Michigan," said White House economic adviser Jared Bernstein.

The Free Press examination of more than 1,800 government reports of those who have received or expect to receive stimulus money found the biggest impact was spurring or protecting public-sector or summer jobs -- not private-sector jobs. Michigan has the nation's worst unemployment rate.

Officials reported that by Sept. 30, some 22,500 Michigan jobs were created or retained thanks to the promise of $5.2 billion in stimulus money for the state, $1.2 billion of which had arrived.

The analysis also found:

• Three of every four stimulus grants, contracts and loans approved in Michigan created or retained one job or less.

• Fewer than 700 awards had received some money, and nearly half of those -- 327 -- had created one job or less, at a cost per job of $2.7 million.

• Some job estimates were wrong: General Motors Co., for instance, reported 105 jobs saved or created for a government purchase of 5,000 vehicles but later said no jobs were saved or created. The City of Detroit reported 342 jobs it now says were projections -- not jobs already created or retained.

Peter Morici, a University of Maryland economist, said the results suggest the stimulus won't deliver promised results.

"All those claims," he said, "are ridiculous."

Flawed reports raise questions about how stimulus has helped

At first glance, the impact of the federal stimulus act so far in Michigan looks like cause for celebration -- some 22,500 jobs created or saved in about seven months, $1.2 billion received to date and promises of $3 billion more to come.

But closer inspection reveals flaws in the claims and raises doubts about the mammoth spending bill's impact to date.

A Free Press analysis of reports on more than 1,800 awards to agencies, departments, municipalities and firms in Michigan under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act found huge inaccuracies in job estimates of several recipients and millions of dollars in errors in their reports.

It also found that the vast majority of jobs reported or created -- 85% -- were tied to 15 primary recipients, with three-quarters of all stimulus awards made to date in the state creating or saving one job or less. Most of those funded still were awaiting checks, which could help explain the lag in job creation. Still, hundreds of awards led to reports of job creation before stimulus money arrived.

Some are clearly wrong.

Detroit reported on a grant award -- $10 million for work on 14 improvement projects in the city -- saying 342 jobs had been saved or created, despite none of the money actually reaching the city yet. Last week, city officials told the Free Press those were only projections -- not jobs saved or created.

The White House Recovery Office warns against projecting jobs. It wants an accurate reflection of jobs created or retained to date.

There were other exaggerations.

The Ingham County Health Department reported 97.49 jobs retained, but an official with the agency said without the funding, six jobs would have been lost. The Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan in Sault Ste. Marie, which provides services to member American Indian tribes, reported 99 jobs created or saved thanks to $46,000 in cost-of-living adjustments for Head Start employees. An official with the tribal council said she believes no jobs would have been lost without the government money.

Promise of transparency

Signing the stimulus bill into law in February, President Barack Obama promised an unprecedented amount of transparency in how the money was spent -- even as officials warned that with so much money being poured into the economy so quickly, there was bound to be error and fraud. While few instances of the latter have been charted, there seem to be may indications of the former.

The $787-billion federal stimulus is the equivalent of about $6,800 for every American household.

Leslee Fritz, director of Michigan's Recovery office, spent two days in Washington, D.C., last week talking to stimulus officials from other states about how to improve reporting. Still, she said, she's pleased with the federal investments.

"In a state like Michigan, there's never going to be a situation where we feel they've moved fast enough" to get money flowing and jobs created, she said. But, she added, "I think we're off to a good start."

The spending

Jared Bernstein, an Obama administration economist, said the reports from agencies and larger contractors getting stimulus money make up a sliver of the stimulus act.

About a third -- $275 billion -- will be directly spent nationally in areas such as state stabilization funds to support government jobs; building and repairing roads, bridges and other infrastructure; investing in drinking water and wastewater projects; funding alternative energy projects, and much more.

Those are the areas where recipients must file reports on their spending. The rest of the stimulus spending goes for tax cuts -- the Making Work Pay tax cut was worth about $65 a month to the average household, for instance -- and entitlement programs, such as those increasing unemployment benefits and covering the government's commitment to pick up 65% of the premium for health insurance for laid-off workers.

Bernstein says those tax cuts and entitlements have already contributed to the 3 million to 4 million jobs expected to be created or retained through the stimulus.

Last month, the Recovery Office reported that $37 billion in checks had gone out for $159 billion in direct investment awards by the end of September. The estimated jobs created or saved: 640,000.

Errors in reporting

Since then, news media reports across the country have found errors. A Boston Globe review last week of claims of 12,374 jobs being created or saved in Massachusetts concluded the claim was "wildly exaggerated." The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel found that a report saying 10,000 jobs had been created or saved in Wisconsin was "rife with errors, double counting and inflated numbers."

"Are you surprised?" asked Peter Morici, an economist and business professor at the University of Maryland who is a critic of the stimulus bill. "Using this ruse, we now have unemployment" nationally "above 10%, and it's going to keep going up. In Michigan it's much worse, and worse is going to become terrible."

Morici's biggest complaint is that, despite Obama's claim last January that 90% of the jobs the stimulus created or retained would be in the private sector, it is set up to produce mostly public-sector jobs.

So far in Michigan, the numbers support his claim. Of 22,513 jobs reported, 13,555 were tied to state money for education, doled out to local school districts. Without a huge economic turnaround or more federal money after the 2-year stimulus ends, many of those jobs could be threatened.

Another problem: More than 3,000 were summer-only jobs for youths. Those jobs do little to bring down Michigan's highest-in-the-nation unemployment rate.

Both Bernstein and Fritz say what's missing from any snapshot analysis of the recipient reports to date is that the stimulus spending is still in its infancy. Investments in so-called shovel-ready projects, such as road and bridge building, are just now getting under way.

Job creation tied to high-speed rail improvements have yet to be felt, and $1.35 billion in grants for advanced battery and electric vehicle manufacturing and development are estimated to create 6,800 jobs in Michigan by the end of 2010.

If they're correct, the stimulus may deliver on its promise.

"We think the kind of time-release mechanisms built into the Recovery Act are very appropriate," Bernstein said. "This is not a program we would want either phasing out or fully up and running at precisely this moment. We need to be generating good jobs at least through next year."

Help for more than jobs

Fritz said she expects job creation to swing from the public sector to the private sector soon, but she also notes that much of the money is for purposes other than jobs. Rental assistance grants, for one, help people stay in their homes, she said, and justice grants help police purchase technology to keep people safe.

The Hamilton Community Health Network in Flint received $625,000 of a $920,000 award for equipment at a new facility serving growing numbers of people who have no or inadequate health insurance.

That award didn't create direct jobs, but Chief Executive Officer Clarence Pierce said without the equipment, the hires the network made for the facility would be irrelevant.

In Ingham County, Deputy Health Officer Jaeson Fournier said the department may not have really retained 97 positions -- but the funding it has received has resulted in nine new hires, with four more jobs being posted and more to come.

Perhaps more important, it received a designation that allows it to collect higher federal reimbursements to serve the growing numbers of uninsured people.

"We have not seen so much demand," Fournier said. "It couldn't have come at a better time for us as a community."

Workers with Posen Construction lay concrete in Detroit on Wednesday. The stimulus funding is boosting Michigan construction jobs. (PATRICIA BECK/Detroit Free Press)

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