Bludgeoned Into Prosperity - District Locals Go Over Ryan's Head For Capital

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Last week Friday, Edward B. Montgomery, President Barack Obama's counsel on automotive communities and workers, completed scheduled appearances in Janesville and Kenosha to find out what kind of help the locals want or expect from the federal government.

State Of Wisconsin Excerpt:
Dr. Montgomery toured the Rock County Job Center, where he learned about the many employment services and programs available to the public. Following the tour, Dr. Montgomery, along with Secretary Gassman, U.S. Representative Tammy Baldwin, Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Mike Sheridan and other officials, heard presentations at the UAW Hall in Janesville.

Both auto communities, reeling from major lay-offs and more expected unemployment, reside in the 1st Congressional District of Wisconsin - Ryan's district. Yet, from all the press accounts I scoured through on this important visit, Congressman Paul Ryan was not acknowledged in attendance.

To be honest, it never really mattered.

In this video posted by the Janesville Gazette, Montgomery mentions Ryan in a roll call of local officials only to find him - not there.

JS Online Excerpt:
So far, $3 billion in federal economic recovery funds has come to Wisconsin; of that, $300 million has been targeted to the congressional district that includes Janesville.

$300 million is nothing to sneeze at but it's only about one-tenth of the money that Ryan has bled away from the district over the past 5 years.

Is that important? I think it is because according to this article published by the Janesville Gazette, the main gripe coming from district constituents at the meeting revolve around the obvious lack of, and access to - capital.

Even today, few people would connect Ryan's deliberate decapitalization of the district through federal grants and assistance, to the tune of $3.5 Billion dollars - that's with a capital B - to the apparent lack of robust intra-district capitalization. While other Wisconsin congressional districts have held a reasonable and steady average in tax return revenue over the past ten years - only Ryan's district has seen a dramatic drop since 2005.

This dramatic drop coincided with Ryan's appointments to the Budget and House Ways and Means committees. At the time, Ryan boasted that he will bring home even less while he had no qualms approving of tax cuts for the rich and appropriating a total of $2.75 trillion for wars, an unfunded pharmaceutical subsidy under Medicare and eventual Wall Street bail-outs, thus sending the country on a glide path of snowballing deficits and fiscal ruin. Some people really believe he's some kind of a fiscal guru. Honest.

Returning to Janesville's recovery, this meeting was attended by local leaders in labor, county and local governments, transportation and housing agencies, health and human services, justice, environmental protection, business, education and economic development, science and technology industries - just about everybody - together they presented a list of eight projects and proposals totaling slightly more than $40 million. But instead of presenting this list of well-intentioned earmarks to Congressman Paul Ryan, where it belongs - these establishment types, many of them known GOP party supporters and deficit spending pseudo-conservatives - present it to the Obama White House official.

The same can be said about the $1.5 billion interstate expansion. So where is our representing congressman? No doubt, he's out somewhere promoting his Randian scheme to pull Social Security and Medicare out from under unemployed worker's feet.

Ironically, a few days after this recovery summit, it was announced by the White House that Montgomery would become the dean of Georgetown University's public policy institute.

DailyMe Excerpt:
I'm disappointed," Borreman's said, "but not disappointed to the degree that it was a waste of time."

What's one more day without help when the district has been dealing with an ideologically damaged and economic's challenged congressman bent on bludgeoning the district into prosperity over the past 12 years?

Like I said earlier, it never really mattered.

You can find Paul Ryan's position on his district's projects and recovery proposals to expand the interstate and stimulate the local economy here.

P.S. Just so you don't think I'm sending you on a wild goose chase, you won't find Ryan's response to his district's local recovery proposals at his House Web page or anywhere on the Web.