Back during the Obama campaign for the stimulus package in February, Vice President Biden was asked by a businesswoman what was in the package to help stimulate small business. His answer at the time was as funny as it was absurd. But today it just got worse.

Back in February, Biden's response to the businesswoman asking about what was in the stimulus package for small business:

JOE BIDEN: "Well, there's a number of ways. It depends on what your business is. I would recommend that woman call my office directly and I will be able to guide her as to what pieces of this package would be directly helpful to her. For example, it may very well be that she is in a circumstance where she is not able...her customers aren't able to get to her. There's no transit capability. The bridge going across the crick to get to her business needs repair." (Video)

So what was Biden's response about what was in the stimulus package for small business? Apparently nothing since all he could come up with was a silly hypothetical where the businesswoman was going out of business because clients couldn't get to her business because of a damaged bridge. And the stimulus bill would fix that bridge.

Well, in a sad twist of irony, we have an article today...

Their livelihood was being threatened, and they were tired of waiting for government help, so business owners and residents on Hawaii's Kauai island pulled together and completed a $4 million repair job to a state park -- for free.

Polihale State Park has been closed since severe flooding destroyed an access road to the park and damaged facilities in December...

And if the repairs weren't made, some business owners faced the possibility of having to shut down...

"We can wait around for the state or federal government to make this move, or we can go out and do our part," Slack said. "Just like everyone's sitting around waiting for a stimulus check, we were waiting for this but decided we couldn't wait anymore."

So a bridge was damaged and customers couldn't get to these small businesses, so they were at risk of going out of business. That was Vice President Biden's exact example. Only thing was, the stimulus package apparently didn't come to the rescue. Neither did state or local government. So the people had to fix it themselves. It's almost like (gasp!) individuals were more efficient than government.

You really couldn't make this stuff up. But you combine a bad "stimulus" bill, Vice President Biden's gift of gaffe, and the predictable inefficiency of government and you're bound to see this kind of stuff.

Still, it was just too good to pass up commenting on. Vice President Biden's precise silly example actually came to pass in real life. And in real life his example of how the stimulus package would help was, as they say, an "epic fail."

Update 4/13/2009: Undeterred by the irony, President Obama then went on to boast about the infrastructure progress.



President Obama declared Monday that his stimulus plan is "starting to work" and that 2,000 transportation projects -- costing much less than expected -- are under way...

"Some may have thought it would have taken months to get to this point," Obama said, "but we have approved these projects in just 41 days."