One of Rep. Mark Kirk's problems with the stimulus package is that he thinks it's wrongly focused. According to the Senate candidate, 80 percent of the package funds "social programs," which are purportedly not "job-producing." We addressed his lousy critique last Friday.  But then an instructive article surfaced this morning.

Because of the nation's credit crisis, lending by the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) dried up in 2008. One solution envisioned by the Obama administration was to devote a certain amount of stimulus dollars to subsidizing lending incentives. Namely, fees that borrowers incur when they deal with the SBA --which typically run about $53,000 for a $2-million loan -- would be entirely waived. After the federal government directing $733 million to the project earlier this year, Crain's reports that the loans are going out faster than ever:

Federal stimulus incentives are jump-starting government-backed loans to small Chicago-area firms, creating almost a year’s worth of activity in the last few months.

Nationally, average weekly loan guarantee approvals by the U.S. Small Business Administration are running 50% ahead of where they were before the stimulus package was enacted Feb. 17, and current loan activity in Illinois is even higher than that, according to Robert Esquivel, chief financial officer of the SBA’s Midwest regional office in Chicago ... Since February, Illinois borrowers have saved $4.8 million in fees on 861 loans totaling $351.3 million, counting all types of SBA loans.

One would suspect that some of the loans allowed businesses to produce jobs.