- $80 million that was spent to build a consulate building in Afghanistan that was abandoned before it was used since it was indefensible against attacks.
- $300 million that was spent to build two Navy ships that were immediately scrapped before they were ever used.
- $500 million that was spent in a program to train Iraqi police officers, a program that is likely to be shut down within a year of starting and be forever known as a failure.
- $184 million that the TSA spend on airport security screening equipment that will never be used and will continue to cost over $2 million to store.
Today's discussion on government waste is sort of a hybrid between these two categories. The National Science Foundation (NSF) wastes millions of dollars every year on idiotic and useless research programs. Thus, this type of government waste is random in that the inane research programs vary year to year but systemic in that the NSF is around every year to approve these inane research programs.
We had previously covered the NSF waste but will review it below as a close to this week's tribute to wasteful government spending (http://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2011/06/national-science-foundation-wasting.html). While reading the following NSF disgraces, keep in mind that at the time of our original blog, the NSF had an annual budget of $6.9 billion. However, there was a move afoot last year to more than double that to $14 billion. It makes you wonder how this is possible, given the lackluster historic and current performance of the NSF.
According to an investigation by the Senate last year and it's final report, the NSF has spent taxpayer money on the following programs through the years:
- How to ride a bike.
- When did dogs become man's best friend?
- Are political views genetically determined?
- How to improve the quality of wine.
- Do boys like to play with trucks and girls like to play with dolls?
- How rumors get started.
- Do parents choose trendy baby names?
- When is the best time to buy a ticket to a sporting event?
- How much housework does a husband create for his wife?
- A virtual recreation of the 1964/1965 World's Fair.
- Sponsorship of a YouTube rap video.
- A review of event ticket prices on Stub Hub.
- What motivates people to make political donations.
- How politicians use the Internet.
- The impact of YouTube on the 2008 U.S. elections.
- A study to determine if playing Farmville helps adults develop and maintain relationships.
- A study on why the same college basketball teams seem to dominate March Madness.
- A study on whether or not online dating site users are racist in their dating habits.
In a time of record budget deficits and almost $16 TRILLION in national debt, do we really want to spend our limited taxpayer dollars on these kinds of research projects? In these days of high gas prices, do we really want to spend our limited taxpayer dollars on Farmville research? In these days of terrorism, do we really want to spend our limited tax payer dollars on anything related to the 1964/1965 World's Fair?
Did neither the NSF Director or any of his 24 member Board know what was going on and what was being funded or did they actually think these were good expenditures? If they did not know what was going on, they should be fired for dereliction of duty. If they did know what was going on relative to these projects, they need to be fired for dereliction of duty and wasting taxpayer money.
But the insanity, incompetence, and waste does not stop with the stupid projects funded above. Misuse of Foundation funds and mismanagement of Foundation operations is also a big waste of taxpayer wealth:
- According to the Senate investigation, the NSF "lacks adequate oversight of its grant funding, which has led to significant mismanagement, fraud, and abuse."
- Internal reports and audits identified various types of mismanagement which resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars being lost to ineffective contracting.
- Rather than being the single government entity responsible for scientific research, the NSF is one of at least 15 Federal departments, 72 Federal agencies, and 12 independent Federal agencies that engage in research and development. These multiple agencies lead to extensive mismanagement, fraud, inefficiencies, and duplication.
- The Senate investigation into these multiple research agencies found there was at least $65 million wasted on low priority projects (see list above), $19 million lost to outright fraud, $1.2 billion wasted because of duplication, and another $1.9 billion wasted because of other forms of mismanagement.
- The Federal Office Of Inspector General (IG) found that the NSF does not have a good process or track record in overseeing how taxpayer money is spent by the grantees receiving it.
- The IG found that many NSF researchers and grantees fail to submit final and annual reports of progress as required, with a 2005 audit calculating that approximately 47% of the 151,000 required project reports were submitted late or never at all.
- Although the NSF has a policy that prevents a researcher getting new NSF funding if the previous project's final report has not been submitted, the audit found that almost 13% of researchers who did not submit a final report did indeed receive new grant money.
- The Inspector General (IG) concluded that while the NSF has tried to improve its management processes, "the IG believes that grant oversight remains as an ongoing management challenge at NSF." In other words, it still stinks.
- Some NSF employees are spending more time searching the Internet for pornography on the job rather than actually doing their job. One senior NSF employee was found to have spent at least 331 days looking at pornography on his government computer and chatting online with nude or partially clad women.
- These pornography escapades by just this one NSF employee cost the American taxpayer between $13,800 and $58,000.
- In one year, ten NSF employees have had misconduct cases brought against them and seven of the ten were for pornography surfing on the job.
- The administrative misuse at the NSF has become so bad that the NSF Inspector General could not even estimate how much money was lost to these types of behavior.
- Not to be outdone by simple Internet pornography surfing, an NSF employee was fired when he organized a jello wrestling event at the NSF's Antarctic research station. These jello wrestling employees were supposed to be looking after the $451 million annual investment the NSF has in Antarctica.
- A pair of NSF employees who were romantically involved were found to have fraudulently run up $144,152 in expenses as a result of their 47 trips taken together.
- Audits found that millions of dollars were misspent on alcohol and other unauthorized, non-research costs.
- And the most damning opinion of all comes from a well know science policy analyst, Daniel Sarwwitz. He is quoted in the Senate report as saying: "The NSF and other civilian research agencies lack the attributes necessary for success, including a focused mission." Well said.
I do not know from the Senate report if anyone at the NSF was fired for this type of wasteful behavior and spending. However, given the recent firing of GSA employees for wasting $832,000 worth of taxpayer wealth on a Las Vegas party, one would hope that many NSF employees were fired for wasting millions of dollars on pornography, romantic trysts, and alcohol. If they have not been fired, they should have been fired since it appears that NSF personnel wastes far more than $832,000 every year, not just one time.
As we have stressed many times this week, not only should the offending and wasteful Federal employees be fired but the Congressional committee members who oversee the NSF should be removed from their committee posts and replaced with people that will not tolerate spending taxpayer money on Farmville, dating site, World's Fair, and other idiotic projects.
One of two things need to be done relative to this waste:
1) Totally eliminate the NSF, and the other Federal research programs that seem to accomplish very little, and return the wealth to the taxpayers. At $6.9 billion a year, every American household would theoretically receive about $60 every year to do with as the want. If the proposed budget went through and this dysfunctional organizations actually got its budget doubled, that $60 a year would turn into an annual windfall of about $120 for every American household. I am positive this approach would result in more positive good for the entire country and its economy than finding out if when dogs became man's best friend.
2) The second option is actually the adult, mature thing to do but I am not sure it is within the realm of possibility and ability of our political class. This country is facing some real and challenging problems, problems that have been with us for decades but seem beyond the reach, the ability, or the brain power of the political class to solve:
- We have been losing the War On Drugs since the Nixon administration.
- We have been without a national energy plan and strategy since the oil shocks and embargoes of the Nixon and Carter administrations.
- We have had an under performing public education system and related processes since the problem was identified and studied early in the Reagan administration.
- We have had an illegal immigration and leaky borders since at least the middle of the Reagan administration when Congress ordered the Defense Department to seal the border within 45 days (never quite finished that assignment, did we?).C
- We have had the problem of ever escalating health care costs since who knows when, a problem that has and will be exacerbated by Obama Care if it is allowed to continue.
- Our country and its citizens have grown steadily more unhealthy as most Americans continue to eat too much, eat too much of the wrong kind of food, do not exercise enough, smoke too much, and as the Baby Boomers mature into their Golden Years, the propensity and incidence of aging diseases (e.g. dementia, Parkinsons, cancers, etc.) become more and more prevalent.
If a proposed research grant in the future was to study how to improve wine, it would not even make it through the first review. Trying to find out how much housework a husband creates for his wife? Do not even bother sending in the grant paperwork since it has no direct connection to the six problems listed above.
Federal research should help citizens overcome the challenges in their lives whether it is with an under performing public education system, the unaffordability of health care insurance, etc. It should not be used to satisfy some private intellectual curiosity of some researcher, a curiosity that will have an extremely minimal impact on American families and businesses.
No more researching Farmville, no more researching World's Fair re-creations, no more researching kids' names. Either focus the attention or return the money to the taxpayers, its the only honorable thing to do. And if the Federal government is going to remain in the research business, find people, both administrators, employees, and Congressional members who will treat it like a well run business and not a cesspool of waste like it is now.
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http://www.unitedstatesofpurple.com/
The United States of Purple is a new grass roots approach to filling the office of President of The United States by focusing on the restoration of freedom in the United States, focusing on problem solving skills and results vs. personal political enrichment, and imposing term limits on all future Federal politicians. No more red states, no more blue states, just one United States Of America under the banner of Purple.
The United States Of Purple's website also provides you the formal opportunity to sign a petition to begin the process of implementing a Constitutional amendment to impose fixed term limits on all Federally elected politicians. Only by turning out the existing political class can we have a chance of addressing and finally resolving the major issues of or times.
Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at www.loathemygovernment.com. It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.
Please visit the following sites for freedom:
http://www.cato.org/
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com/
http://www.flipcongress2010.com/
http://www.reason.com/
http://www.repealamendment/
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