This is our fourth installment this month and we are nowhere near the end of the latest insanity from our politicians:
1) The Washington Free Beacon recently reported that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) had paid taxpayer dollars for the development of two video games that promote healthier eating. The first one is called “Escape from Diab,” a “nightmare” fictional city where people are only allowed to eat junk food.
“The story centers around five children who must get healthy enough to escape the evil King Etes,” explains Archimage, Inc., a computer game company that received over $9 million to create the games. King Etes is a fat ruler who forces his people to eat out of vending machines.
According to the Diab website: “Deejay, an athletic inner city youth, accidentally tumbles into an abandoned building and through its rotting floor. When he awakes, he finds himself in Diab, a nightmare city where people eat nothing but junk food.”
Here’s an idea for another nightmare: spend $9 million on a video game that will likely never be seen by more than a handful of kids or adults across the country and have virtually no impact on the food habits of America. How many homeless people could have been fed or sheltered for $9 million, how veterans could get the medical care they have been denied for $9 million, how many drug addicts could have gotten the detox treatment they need before they kill themselves on an overdose?
$9 million? Are you kidding me? Such insanity.
2) There has been a lot of news coverage of the so-called Obamaphone disaster that has been going on for years. In this wasting of taxpayer money, American taxpayers subsidize cellular and home phone service for people that have more than enough wealth to pay for their own phone service.
Additionally, the companies providing the service under this wasteful program have been big political campaign donors to Democrats for which they are rewarded with an out of control spending government program, crony capitalism at its worse. Rather than have been try to explain the latest disgraces out of this program, I refer to the following link that gives the details of this wasting of taxpayer wealth:
3) In the Federal government, inspector general organizations within each major branch of the government serve as the auditors and policemen of Federal agency spending, making sure that as best as possible that government procedures and processes are as honest and efficient as possible. A major problem arises when these guardians of the taxpayer wealth are actually the culprits that are wasting the taxpayer wealth.
According to a Washington Examiner article from November 12, 2014, written by Paul Bedard, over half of the credit card charges made by people working in the EPA’s inspector general organization were “improper.” A review of “high risk” credit card charges by that agency’s auditors found that more than half were for such non-job related items such as police equipment and “novelty items.”
In a two year audit of expenses from that inspector general organization, in a sample of expenses charged by workers totaling $62,012, $36,488. Well over half, were improper, according to the analysis titled, "Spending Taxpayer Dollars: Ineffective Oversight of Purchase Cards Resulted in Improper Purchases at EPA OIG." The report found shoddy recordkeeping and sloppy use of government credit cards as the main culprits for the improper use o taxpayer funds.
Thus, at least in this case of wasteful spending, the foxes were put in charge of guarding the henhouse, i.e. the EPA inspector general organization was guilty of the type of behavior it is supposed to catch and correct.
4) We have previously reported how the U.S. military involvement in Afghanistan has turned that country into the biggest heroin producer in the world. According to numerous news reports, and a recent article in Businessweek, the U.S. has spent $7.6 billion since 2002 trying to get rid of the Afghan poppy fields with absolutely no success.
Never one to give up, the political class and the Federal government are now taking a different approach to the heroin problem that originates out of the country‘s poppy fields. Their new approach: goats. The U.S. government recently sent nine specially selected male goats to Afghanistan with the hope of creating a bigger Afghan cashmere industry.
The theory is that if the stock of Afghan goats can be improved, their hair can be cultivated for cashmere applications and people will stop producing poppy plants and start producing better cashmere. The nine goats are supposed to be the start of this revolution and the end of the Afghan poppy and heroin trade.
Two thoughts here, neither of them very complimentary of the Federal government:
- Why didn’t we try this latest and greatest idea BEFORE we wasted $7.6 billion on the other failed ideas? Nine goats has to be cheaper than $7.6 billion.
- Does any sane person really think that nine goats is going to make a hill of difference against a multi-billion dollar poppy industry? According to the Businessweek article, there are no refining and development facilities for the cashmere in the country. The raw hair would still have to be sent out of country for production.
5) It is not just the humongous Federal government that wastes taxpayer wealth. Consider a short report from the January, 2015 issue of reason magazine on a local Minneapolis taxpayer funded organization. Community Action of Minneapolis is chartered to provide energy assistance, skills training, and others services to less affluent people in its community.
However, a state government audit found that the organization spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars on cruises. Spa treatments, a loaner care, and bonuses for staff and board members. Not quite the expenses you would expect to see from an entity that is supposed to be helping the poor.
That will do it for today but more insanity to follow in the days to come. Today we learned that government bureaucrats can waste money wherever they exist, from a small non-profit entity in Minnesota to the Federal government’s EPA in Washington. We learned that the federal government is using nine goats to try and solve a problem that $7.6 billion could not solve. We learned that Obamaphone fraud is still alive and striving. And that for over $9 million, you can build a silly video game on junk food that will serve no societal benefit. Insane.
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:
Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w
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