Keep going, doc. I think you’re on to something:
U.S. Senator Tom Coburn, M.D. (R-OK) today released a new oversight report, “Wastebook 2011″ that highlights over $6.5 billion in examples of some of the most egregious ways your taxpayer dollars were wasted. This report details 100 of the countless unnecessary, duplicative and low-priority projects spread throughout the federal government.
“Video games, robot dragons, Christmas trees, and magic museums. This is not a Christmas wish list, these are just some of the ways the federal government spent your tax dollars. Over the past 12 months, politicians argued, debated and lamented about how to reign in the federal government’s out of control spending. All the while, Washington was on a shopping binge, spending money we do not have on things we do not absolutely need. Instead of cutting wasteful spending, nearly $2.5 billion was added each day in 2011 to our national debt, which now exceeds $15 trillion,” Dr. Coburn said.
A select few of the dirty hundred:
• $75,000 to promote awareness about the role Michigan plays in producing Christmas trees & poinsettias.
• $15.3 million for one of the infamous Bridges to Nowhere in Alaska.
• $113,227 for video game preservation center in New York.
• $550,000 for a documentary about how rock music contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
• $48,700 for 2nd annual Hawaii Chocolate Festival, to promote Hawaii’s chocolate industry.
• $350,000 to support an International Art Exhibition in Venice, Italy.
• $10 million for a remake of “Sesame Street” for Pakistan.
• $35 million allocated for political party conventions in 2012.
• $765,828 to subsidize “pancakes for yuppies” in the nation’s capital.
• $764,825 to study how college students use mobile devices for social networking.
There are literally thousands of these expenditures — relatively small outlays for things that the federal government has no business spending tax dollars on. It really highlights the need for a presidential line item veto — something the American people desire overwhelmingly but that the Supreme Court has struck down a couple of times already.
If the Congress was serious about cutting spending, they would go through the budget with a fine toothed comb to ferret out these nonsensical expenditures before they cut one penny from entitlements. Medicare and Social Security reform are vital, of course, but an argument can be made that those programs are indeed the province of the national government and are necessary. The examples given above have no business in the federal budget and are unnecessary and wasteful.
To change the culture in Washington means changing the way our elected leaders view the expenditure of tax dollars. And there is no better place to start than the thousands of meaningless outlays that weigh down the budget and have no justification for being funded by the taxpayer.
“It really highlights the need for a presidential line item veto — something the American people desire overwhelmingly but that the Supreme Court has struck down a couple of times already.”
I cannot believe that anyone here is seriously proposing a Presidential line item veto, after seeing how ready the current President is to rule by decree. It is only because Congress retains the power of the purse that it has any relevance, and any power, at all—because the President must at some point placate the Congress to get money. If the President can at will eliminate Congressional appropriations, Congress has no power over him. Furthermore, there is no guarantee that the President—certainly not this one, but not any other either—will be wise in his use of the sole discretion that a line-item veto gives.
Eliminate wasteful and extra-Constitutional spending? Absolutely. By line-item veto? Not on your life. There is no quick fix for a problem that has been building for a hundred years and more.
Agreed, except about the quick fix. I have one. Constitutional Amendment. Every expenditure must be stand-alone, that is, be its own bill/law with no riders or amendments.
The problem is that this stupid stuff can be slipped through without a specific vote. If they had to actually record a vote on these things, they would never, ever pass. Accountability.
This, or a new rope…. >:)
A Constitutional Amendment such as you mention would not be effective unless general accounting principals are agreed upon and enforced. Congress exempts itself from accounting principals it mandates for citizens.
The amounts shown are meaningless because they are just cyphers.
Surely, somewhere in the bowels of the IRA, there are breakdowns of income taxes paid by cities, counties, etc. Maybe even alphabetically by last initial.
Don’t tell the public that “$764,825 to study how college students use mobile devices for social networking.” tell them “All the residents whose last name begins with “X” in the state of XXX had their taxes spent on a “study how college students use mobile devices for social networking”. THAT would personalize the squandered money and perhaps finally rouse the citizens to yell “Hey! Wait a minute!”
When only dollar amounts are used, people think either “Well, it’s ONLY pennies per citizen” or “That the OTHER guy’s money, not mine.” Take away the anonymity and see what happens.
Actually I think promoting Sesame Street in the middle east is a damn good idea, even if it’s expensive, we got to get a foot in the door early, cause those cultures are hateful.
That is unless they teach addition in the traditional way:
“I have 10 Jews to kill, I kill 4 of them, how many Jews are left to kill?”
That is more than likely the how the final product would look. I can see it now- Grover and Kermit with AK-47′s and rocket launchers, Oscar building IED’s, and Elmo preaching jihad and wearing an explosive vest.
Miss Piggy is going to present a real problem…
You haven’t seen Sesame Street lately. The values they promote aren’t the values we remember from even a few years ago.
Also these are prioritized in a wasteful way.
It is much more important if we waste 10% of a billion dollar program than if we waste 100% of a $70000 program. I can’t understand why someone would make a list that isn’t ordered by amount of money wasted.
Who are you and what have you done with Josh Scholar?
“If they had to actually record a vote on these things, they would never, ever pass.”
I get dozens of things on the internet that say I must check that I have read something before I can proceed on that site. I don’t understand why that couldn’t be done with Congressional votes. My guess would be it could be done with the machines that are already being used to record votes.
Once it got to the point where a voter could ask the candidate why he voted to support “$550,000 for a documentary about how rock music contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union.” and the candidate could not deny it I believe we would see a lot less of these candidates supporting this garbage.
What about $5.8 million 23 members of Congress received farm subsidy payments between 1995 and 2009?
http://agricultureunderattack.wordpress.com/2011/12/20/farm-bill-101/
Which one of these jobs would be best for a teen?
http://www.cagw.org/reports/pig-book/2010/
9,129 “porkulus” for 2010.
A fabulous read. Projects, States, Authors, etc.
Line Item Veto is a sham.
Congress will be responsible for proposing, funding (according to CBO projections) specific projects in one bill. Period.
A rewrite of Congressional procedural voting and “in committee” add-ons must be Speaker Boehner’s priority. Only House Rules Committee and the Speaker can make internal changes to “this august body.”
Culture of corruption continues unabated. Changes are necessary: 1)A parttime Congress meeting every other year. 2)Reduced (one half) salaries. 3) Cut staffs in half. And more to come.
It’s We The People vs. We The Elite People in Washington DC. We The People are being trampled on, trod on and completely abused. Its time to stop this culture of corruption.
They want to take away our freedoms. Next they’re “working under the radar” to confiscate all weapons legally in the hands of US Citizens. There “strange” references to “detention camps” for purposes of FEEMA uses around the USA.
What bill authorized these “FEEMA Detention camps?”
We The Elite People in Washington DC cannot be trusted to “do the People’s work.” They are doing the work of a top down, command type economy whose goal is to completely eradicate:1) Our religion, 2) Education, 3) Bottom up representative form of government, and 4) Financial system of capitalism.
Wake up America! Vote massively in 2012 for massive fraud is all around us.
If We The People don’t arise, wake-up, when we awake from our slumber, We The People will have been shorn of everything American. Our America will be very socialist. God Bless America.
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Most of this stuff is the result of “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” deals between and among Congress critters. It is the only truly bi-partisan activity in Congress.
And how many millions go to the National Council of La Raza?
In Spanish “La Raza” does not mean “greater good.”
While those are annoying examples and they do add up, they’re chump change compared to things like the Stupid Launch System that Congress is mandating NASA to build. Projected costs are over $40 billion for research and development and like well over a billion dollars per flight. It’s so expensive, there is no money left over to develop any payloads for it. It’s truly the “rocket to nowhere” but it ensures the pork goes to politically connected congressional districts. Sad to day, Republicans like Senator Shelby (AL) and Kay Bailey Hutchinson (TX) are some of the worst offenders in this debacle.
These are all extremely trivial. We need to strike at the heart of the beast.
1) Repeal Obamacare.
2) Repeal Dodd/Frank.
3) Repeal Sarbanes/Oxley
4) Eliminate the EPA
5) Eliminate the Dept of Education
6) Eliminate the Dept of Energy
7) Eliminate the ATF
8) Eliminate Americorps
9) Repeal the Give/Serve act
10) Eliminate the NLRB
The above would represent a decent start, then we should get serious.
We should eliminate everything the federal govt does that isn’t clearly within the federal government’s enumerated powers.
And this list only scratches the surface. It is not only in the things they do, it is HOW they do the things they do.
The government often spends more money evaluating proposals than the cost of the proposal itself. So they spent 48K on a chocolate festival. How much did they spend deciding that the money would be spent? Studying it? Overseeing it? Reporting it? Liaisoning with each other in endless catered meetings? And of course, each of those vitally needed bureaucrats can then retire at a respectably young age with life long taxpayer-funded privileges?
It’s even the things we WANT. We want national parks, right? We want the government to have some supporting agency for the Indian Reservations. (OK, for rhetorical purposes, assume that we do.) And National Parks and Bureau of Indian Affairs are both part of the Department of the Interior. So why is it the National Park Service needs its own Indian Affairs Liaison office? What the hell do they do that the guys down the hall can’t do? Or are they getting paid just to “liaison” with the guys down the hall?
No business could survive with such layers of fat. Could you imagine asking a mechanic to “check the air in the tires, while you’re at it” and being told “I’ll have to forward the request to the Pneumatic Operations Affairs Office”. This is how government works.
And Commerce also has an office of Native American Affairs. Why? Interior’s guys can’t handle the workload on their own? Fire them and replace them with people who can.
We have Secretary of the Treasurer. Fine. We also have a Treasurer of the United States. Excuse me, but WTF does she do? The office was vacant for over 9 years out of the last 50, did ANYONE notice something not happening because we didn’t have a treasurer in addition to the secretary?
Why does the Treasury need two whole COMMITTEES to approve designs on coins?
Why do we have a National Economic Council? And a Council of Economic Advisors doing the SAME thing… and why can’t the department of Commerce do it? Isn’t that what they’re for?
While we’re at it, what’s “Homeland Security” if not the very reason for the existence of a department named “Defense”? Defense of what, if not the homeland?
We need counter-terrorism. But do we need State to have its own office for counter-terrorism. Defense, Justice, and Homeland Security not enough? Ca’t we pick just one agency and say “it’s yours, 100% yours, you do it, and you do everything that has to do with it”?
We know the reality, don’t we: There’s big budget dollars in counter-terrorism, and every stuffed shirt wants a piece of the pie. And now with all those different agencies we have to- oh joy!- pay still more bureaucrats to “liaison” with each other, so the FBI doesn’t accidentally step on the toes of the Department of State’s counter-terrorism office!
Why does the Department of the INTERIOR have an Office of INTERNATIONAL affairs? Department of State can’t be trusted? Or did we have to make up more jobs for campaign contributors?
There is massive redundancy at every level. There are Agencies we don’t need, and in the agencies we do need, there are divisions and bureaus we don’t. And in the divisions and bureaus we need, there are offices we don’t. In the offices we need, there are people we don’t.
We could probably fire half of Washington, and the half left would be able to do every *valuable* task in government.
I am all for eliminating all foreign aid with the exception of help during a natural disaster. 10 million for miss piggy in pakistan? Does she wear a burka, is she circumcised?