The American Jobs Act, Part II

Rep. Louie Gohmert becomes my comic hero of the day by swiping the name of the American Jobs Act for his own bill...

Texas GOP Rep. Louis Gohmert officially introduced the American Jobs Act of 2011 on Wednesday afternoon.

"My bill is not the president's bill, it's a real job creator," Gohmert told The Hill, shortly after filing his two-page alternative to the president's plan, under the same title.

Gohmert said that he read the president's 155-page jobs plan, when it was emailed to lawmakers on Monday afternoon.

Calling the president's plan a "disaster," Gohmert said that he checked to see "who filed the 'American Jobs Act' for the president, here in the House, since we had to do it 'now, right away," but discovered that the plan had not been officially introduced in the House.

So, at 1:20pm Gohmert filed his own version of a jobs bill, under the title included on the president's legislation distributed to members of Congress two-days prior.

Unfortunately, it appears that you can use the name on multiple bills, so this isn't quite as awesome as it could have been.  But still, a few thoughts...

1.  Yes, it's a cheap political stunt.  Guess what?  So is Obama's bill.

2.  Gohmert's bill has at least as good a chance of passing as Obama's.  Both have been blasted by Democrats, but Gohmert's has not drawn any derision from the GOP.

3.  No Dem has introduced this in the House?  I thought we needed to pass this now!!!

4.  Seriously, is it a further sign of incompetence that they haven't even introduced the bill that Obama wants passed yesterday?  Or are Dems running away as fast as they can?

5.  Yes, Gohmert will be reported to Attack Watch.  I'm sure they'll get around to rebutting him... and if it's based on how well they do everything else, that should be in 2013.

6.  Jon Stewart is right -- the American Jobs Act is a ridiculously dumb name.  But perhaps someone else (like Ron Paul) can introduce a bill with that title that advocates the drowning of kittens or something equally ludicrous, so people can run ads saying, "Representative Pelosi voted FOR the infamous American Jobs Act.  The American Jobs Act mandated the drowning of kittens!"