Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack appeared on MSNBC this morning and was asked about new numbers that show one in seven Americans are now receiving food stamps.

His response? Why, it’s a JOBS PROGRAM!!!! He even managed to come up with a new multiplier effect number:

So here’s the question. If food stamps create jobs, like Vilsack says here, and we’re putting record numbers of Americans on food stamps, then why aren’t we seeing record job creation? If every dollar spent on food stamps creates $1.84 in production, as Vilsack argues, and the number of food stamp recipients keeps rising, then why haven’t the GDP numbers reflected that fabulous growth?

The utter ridiculousness of this man’s argument, and of this administration as a whole, would be riotously funny, were it happening to another country. Unfortunately, it’s happening to us.

This isn’t even literate enough to be called Keynesianism. It’s just breathtakingly obtuse.

And it’s also going to spread, for I believe that this is precisely the approach the Obama campaign is going to take in the coming months – they can’t hide from their record, so they may as well write a Craigslist ad for it, throw it in a dress, and hope enough people are desperate enough to believe everything they’re told.