Can the president order a jobs bill fixing bridged by labeling it disaster relief or something

[Maraya1969]

like that? I remember the bridge that collapsed in WV when I was a kid. Can't he use some sort of preemptive jobs bills to fix these bridges to kills two birds with one stone, fix the bridges and jump start the economy also?

[lacrew]

1. No

1) ARRA was supposed to do just that...'infrastructure' was the selling point. I was wholeheartedly in support...but strangely few bridges were repaired.

2) If he were to do that, congress would be left with the unsavory task of deciding where to take the money from. We are about to hit the debt limit once again, and any large scale spending plan would either require an increase in the limit, or a cut in another area.

3) Now this is the most important one. Think about the worst politician you know of, who has presidential aspirations. Would you want that person to ever have the power to mislabel spending projects as 'disaster relief'?

[Enrique]

2. yes, and he did

last fall, his jobs bill had a large infrastructure part, but no one expected the GOP to go along with it and indeed they did not.

[Webster Green]

3. It would be such a positive step to initiate a program to repair and update our infrastructure.

It would create so many jobs, and achieve things that really need to be done at some point.

Unfortunately, we have a dis-functional government, that is incapable of getting anything done.

Imagine if we started a massive infrastructure improvement project and ended all the stupid wars we are engaged in.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

4. No

No he cannot order it. It requires funding and must go through legislative branch first

[Maraya1969]

5. OK what about FEMA. Declaring a fedefal disaster for some of the bridges?

I am sure some of them are in disaster situation.

I am just brain storming. There has to be a way to get around this block everything congress.