The ailing U.S. economy needs a big shot in the arm, and a stimulus plan is the first order of business for the newly elected Congress. Maine's representatives -- Republican Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins and Democratic Reps. Michael Michaud and Chellie Pingree -- have a historic role to play in helping shape and pass that legislation, which represents the largest public spending program in this country since World War II.

President-elect Barack Obama has unveiled the outlines of his $775 billion, two-year stimulus proposal: It will include a $300 million tax cut, massive spending on infrastructure improvements in states, increased Medicaid reimbursement payments to the states, increases in food stamp payments and an expansion of jobless benefits.

Originally, Obama said he wanted Congress to debate and pass a plan and have it ready for his signature as soon as he was inaugurated on Jan. 20.

That's unlikely to happen, which is a good thing.

As the country has already seen with the $700 billion Treasury Department plan to rescue Wall Street (and Detroit and who knows what else at this point), a spending program without adequate oversight or fleshed-out details is a spending plan that may not deliver results and rapidly loses the public's confidence.

Instead, Congress -- and by that we mean both Democrats and Republicans, working together -- must carefully deliberate over this plan and build into it the kind of rigorous oversight that has been missing from last year's rescue program.

While it's naive to believe that such a large spending program won't have its share of waste and even fraud, it's appropriate for our lawmakers to demand performance standards and accountability in the programs funded by the stimulus.

Both Michaud and Pingree have said their priority this session is passage of a stimulus plan, and Michaud joined a group of rural lawmakers in Congress on Wednesday in a joint statement stressing that their communities should not miss out on any stimulus spending.

"Rural America cannot afford to be shortchanged in an economic recovery package," said Michaud and his colleagues.

Pingree says that any plan should extend unemployment benefits, invest in infrastructure repair, put more money into health care -- especially Medicaid -- and help expand access to broadband in rural areas of the state.

Yet the major horsetrading over the stimulus is likely to be with members of the Senate, given that the Democrats there don't enjoy the commanding majority they do in House. Which means, as we've written before, that Snowe and Collins, two moderate Republicans, are important players. And the Obama administration, eager to demonstrate its commitment to bipartisanship, contacted both Snowe and Collins last month. Obama spoke with Snowe about his desire to work with her on economic issues and Biden discussed with Collins what she would like to see included in the stimulus package.

In a letter Collins sent to the president-elect, she wrote that she wants increased spending for transportation infrastructure, for energy efficiency and environmental projects protecting water quality and for new and innovative technology development. She'd like the feds to pay more of the cost paid now by states for treating Medicaid patients -- those costs are the second largest component of state budgets.

Snowe wrote to the president-elect that she wants more funding for food stamps; an extension of unemployment insurance benefits; tax breaks and assistance to small businesses in getting credit; and, like Collins, she would like to see greater investments in energy efficiency.

We have no doubt that all the members of Maine's congressional delegation know what Maine needs in a stimulus package. They and their colleagues are in touch with Gov. John Baldacci's office, with their own constituents, with community and business leaders throughout the state. They know that our towns and villages are suffering job losses and that many residents are cold, some of them are hungry and most are in need of greater opportunity. Our schools are hurting and our roads and bridges are in bad shape.

Taking those needs, representing them and reconciling them with the needs of an entire nation -- as well as with a partisan agenda -- is the challenge for Snowe, Collins, Michaud and Pingree as they work on a stimulus bill. We wish them much wisdom as they navigate this historic opportunity, and we hope that as the pressure mounts, their allegiance will be strongest to state and country -- and not to narrow party politics.