It seems only fitting that the Pittsburgh Steelers won the Super Bowl in these harsh economic times.

The team from the gritty Steel City pulled it out in the end. This hard-nosed, hard-hitting football team won by inches with a breathtaking catch and two toes in bounds.

And oh how we love our football analogies like “Let’s level the playing field,” “Take one for the team,” and “Take the ball and run with it.”  

Perhaps in light of the gritty Steelers victory, we can apply some of those analogies to the state of our economy.  Locally, we learned this week that the URI Ryan Center and Boss Ice Arena are losing money – $1.1 million and $175,000 this year respectively. We guess the students will have to take one for the team by way of increased fees – projected at $130 more next year.

Yet we also learned that the construction of the $27 Million State Police Administrative building in North Scituate is going ahead as planned.  Though we don’t think such a building project should go through at present, we guess the police are taking the ball (or should we say bond – approved seven years ago) and running with it.  

Even local churches are getting hit hard.  One church in South County is cutting budgets in all departments by ten percent, not granting staff raises, and not re-hiring for an associate pastor position.  

Perhaps it’s time for a Hail Mary. Or perhaps Obama’s $850 Billion  stimulus package or the $940 Million of Federal money projected to flow into the state will help. The money just might help level the playing field somewhat and Rhode Island’s unemployment rate won’t be the worst in the whole nation.  Projects financed by the inflow of cash will put people back to work or back in the game.

The money looks to help cities and towns with much needed projects, like fixing up the Route 95 off- and on-ramps in Richmond.

It’s time for us to dig in at the line of scrimmage and fight like those Steelers. What else can you do but play hard-nosed, keep your head in the game, and play the full 60 minutes. It’s time for a goal line stand, time to create a turnover, time for a comeback, time for a blitz and a sack – time to change the momentum of the game we call the economy.  

One way to do that is spend, spend, spend but the cash is flowing like the last two minutes of a close football game.

SLOWLY.