Louisiana to seek "wasteful spending" for NOLA-BR high-speed rail

Jindal said it was wasteful, not that it would not create new jobs. The benefits you listed are true but there is another side to the equation, the cost.

For example, a solar panel array to provide the power for an average household cost around 30 to 40 thousand dollars. Better insulating the average household would cost about a quarter of that. And better insulated homes would help prevent people freezing to death during cold spells (in Chicago many elderly people died due to poor insulation this winter). Since the housing market dried up the people being hired to install the insulation would more likely be someone who recently filed for unemployment. Which is the primary objective of the stimulus.

So by comparison providing solar panels for people is not as effective as providing people with better insulation. That does not mean the solar panels would not be beneficial just that the benefit per dollar is greater providing insulation. Thus one could argue that providing solar panels would be wasteful.