Dumb And Dumber

Legislation: Over the weekend, President Obama encouraged everyone to read his jobs proposal and judge it for themselves. We took him up on his offer, and found five more reasons to kill the bill.

We've noted how Obama's so-called jobs bill is an expensive rehash of all the policy failures he's already imposed on the country, with the only new idea being several job-killing tax hikes.

But when he urged Americans during his weekly Saturday address to read the bill and decide for themselves, we thought we'd give the 155-page bill another try. Our conclusion: It's even worse than we thought. Among the dumber ideas tucked in:

• Wage insurance: The bill would let states use unemployment funds to make up the difference between an over-50 worker's previous wage and what he gets paid at his new job. Why not? Isn't it written in the Bill of Rights somewhere that no American shall ever be forced to take a job paying less than his previous one?

• Bridge to nowhere: Obama claims his "Bridge to Work" idea will let people on unemployment "participate in temporary work as a way to build their skills," citing the Georgia Works program as an example. But as Reuters reported, only 92 had signed up for that program since February and, according to the person in charge, it's "fraught with problems."

• 48th federal jobs training program: Obama would also create a $50 million training program for transportation jobs. Does he really think another federal jobs training program on top of the 47 existing failures — costing a combined $18 billion — will make a difference?

• Let's share: Borrowing from job-creation machines such as Italy, the bill would let companies cut workers' hours, rather than lay them off, with unemployment insurance making up most of the difference in pay.

Sounds great, except that it would be ripe for abuse. And while more than a dozen states — including California and New York — already have similar "work share" programs, almost no one uses them because of all the fraud-preventing red tape involved.

• Sued for hiring: How do you get jittery businesses to hire? Threaten to sue them if they hire someone who already has a job! At least, that's how the White House thinks. It stuffed in a provision to make it illegal to "discriminate" against the unemployed when hiring.

Given all this dreck, is it any wonder that so few have bothered to take Obama up on his oft-repeated call for citizens to flood lawmakers' offices with demands that they "pass this bill"?