I suppose in many ways it’s a good thing that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is ready for President Obama’s signature tomorrow. It means that the folks in Washington will start talking about something else now.

Fingers crossed.

Just so you know, there’s not really much in this bill for you if you are a microbusiness owner who is (a) not in the market for a loan or (b) a federal contractor. The rest of us will just have to wait and see if the grand plan works to put people back to work, get money into their pockets and, we hope, persuade them to spend some of it again.

Meanwhile, lots and lots of scrutiny of the SBA’s entrepreneurial development program this week. They’ve always been among my favorite small business assistance offerings but, of course, nothing is perfect.

It’ll be interesting to see whether some of the issues voiced by various parties last week will be written into upcoming SBA reauthorization legislation (you remember the SBA reauthorization, right?) or whether lawmakers will boost the programs’ funding and see if they take care of it themselves.

Somehow, I doubt they’ll go with Plan B there. Something about being a policy makers that seems to make folks lean toward micromanagement, not to say control freakishness.

For more information:

House Committee on Small Business
National Association for the Self-Employed
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (H.R. 1) (THOMAS)