The Slop Master Wins Again

Old saying: "If pigs could vote, the man with the slop bucket would be elected swineherd every time, no matter how much slaughtering he did on the side." Unfortunately, the American voter seems to vote in this pig-like manner whenever the political class brings the slop bucket around at budget time and doles out the local wastes of money. In fiscal year 2010, you can look forward to the following projects being executed to sop up your tax dollars:

The following examples come from Anderson Cooper's (CNN fame) 360 website:

• $200,000 for the Arkansas Commercial Driver Training Institute
• $150,000 for education programs and exhibitions at the Washington DC National Building Museum.
• $134,000 for the Montana World Trade Center.
• $100,000 for the Myrtle Beach International Trade and Conference Center.
• $500,000 for exhibits at the National Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium in Dubuque, Iowa.
• $200,000 for the Washington (state) Opera.
• $150,000 for exhibits and interactive displays at the Teddy Roosevelt Inaugural Site Foundation.

The following examples come from the Citizens Against Government Waste organization's website:

• $1 million for repairs, restoration, and modernization of the Portsmouth, NH Music Hall.
• $400,000 to restore and renovate the historical Ritz theater in Newburgh, NY.
• $350,000 to renovate the Uptown Theater in Philadelphia.
• $250,000 for construction of the Monroe County Farmer's Market in Kentucky.
• $250,000 to renovate the Murphy Theater in Ohio
• $194,000 for restoration of the Slater Mill in Rhode Island.
• $150,000 to renovate the Pregone Theater in the Bronx.
• $100,000 to build the Santa Ana River Trail in California.

These are just 15 of the over 5,000 wasteful spending projects in the current Federal budget. A few observations:

• If you look at who sponsored each of these projects, all of the sponsors are from the states where the project will be executed. There are no sponsored projects from a politician who lives in another state, implying to me that this is nothing more than a hometown ploy to buy votes at the next election with taxpayer money.
• None of these listed projects contribute to reducing the deficit, create long term, enduring jobs, reduce taxes, extend unemployment benefits for the record number of unemployed, ease the pain and suffering of our service men and women returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, fix the failing public schools in the country, reduce the solvency vulnerability of Social Security and Medicare, eliminate the drug scourge across the nation, etc. They are simply bribes for votes while other more critical national needs are not addressed. Thus, we continue to waste projects on local projects that will positively impact very few citizens compared to how those same dollars could be more effectively spent to benefit unemployed fellow citizens, returning service personnel, our children's education, etc.
• As we recalled in Sunday's post, several decades ago when the Statue Of Liberty needed renovation, modernization and restoration, the country's citizens stepped forward to pay for the effort. What has happened since then that gave the political class permission to restore other structures with far less impact, legacy, and fame than the Statue Of Liberty? Could it be that the Statue of Liberty was owned by the nation as a whole and sponsoring its renovation with Federal taxpayer dollars would not get any politician any addition votes?
• In "Love My Country, Loathe My Government", we talk about not only the waste of pure dollars spent on these projects but the wasted staff time and Congressional time and effort spent on identifying, quantifying, and presenting these types of small projects for approval and budgeting. Rather than working on major, national issues, small minded politicians worry about farmer's markets in Kentucky or run down mills in Rhode Island. If the country had no other problems, than this waste of time might be justified. However, as we all know, that is not the case in today's America.
• Step 44 of "Love My Country, Loathe My Government" is more critical than ever. Step 44 would "prohibit the use of Federal programs or tax dollars for any project unless it materially benefits a high percentage of residents in five states." The current political class members has shown year end and year out that they do not have the discipline to not waste taxpayer dollars on wasteful, pork laden projects. Only an overarching rule such as Step 44, applied consistently to every member of Congress would be able to stem the waste.

Unfortunately, as long as the political class brings around the slop bucket, we will be tempted to continue to vote for them to get our share of slop while the nation and many, many of its citizens continue to be slaughtered, both figuratively and literally. Hopefully, we will eventually learn our lesson and not vote as if the pigs were the electorate.

Visit our website at www.loathemygovernment.com to order an autographed copy of the book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government -Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom and Destroying The American Political Class" and to sign up for the cause. The book is also available online at Amazon and Barnes And Noble.

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