The Stimulus: Waste Not, Want Not

Speaker Pelosi's Pork House, Leading to the Poorhouse?

Pelosi & Pals' Payoffs and Pork Bill

According to a recent post on FRCblog, “(T)he Congressional Budget Office (CBO) recently found that the cost of the Pelosi-Reid stimulus package now exceeds $1.1 trillion. CBO also estimated that only 7 percent of infrastructure money would make its way into the economy by the end of the year and only 38 percent would be spent by the end of the 2010 fiscal year. Senator Jeff Session's (R-Ala.) office estimates the actual number going to tangible road and bridge construction is just a little more than 3 percent.

“Where is this money going to? A not exhaustive look at the 1,588 page legislation, H.R. 1, "The American Recovery & Reinvestment Act of 2009" shows the bill is more payoffs and pork then stimulus . . ."

Here are a few examples of the many political payoffs and the slices of pork that make up the falsely named economic "stimulus package." It is an appropriations bill that bypasses all the Congressional debate and public scrutiny. As a whole it is a shameful and egregious waste of taxpayer money. No Senate Republican or principled Democratic Senator should vote for this horrific bill.

The following list is a condensed version of the one outlined on the FRCblog post.

PAYOFFS

(I.) To the "Green" Lobby –(Environmental extremists)

$600 Million To Buy New Cars For Government Workers (Page 89)

These cars would be "green" friendly cars - however very few gas pumps have the right gas to run these cars. The Federal government already spends $3.5 billion a year.

(II.) To the Unions - (The Leftist Teacher's Unions, etc)

"$150 billion in new federal spending, a vast two-year investment that would more than double the Department of Education's current budget. The proposed emergency expenditures on nearly every realm of education, including school renovation, special education, Head Start and grants to needy college students" Sam Dillon, "Stimulus Plan Would Provide Flood of Aid to Education," New York Times. January 27, 2009. NOTE: Private and religious schools are excluded.

(III.) To the Abortion Industry - (The Pro-Death Crowd)

Representative Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) inserted in the original bill billions of dollars for family planning groups, including the abortion giant, Planned Parenthood. Pressure and public exposure from Congressional Republicans forced the Democrats to remove such funding from this bill. However the bill still provides billions in reforming the health care system and working towards nationalized health care - with little to no debate.

$2.7B in NIH grants which would be targeted to among other things embryonic stem cell experimentation. (Page 56)

(IV.) Other Special Interests - (Homosexual Activists, etc.)

$3 Billion for Prevention & Wellness Programs, Including $335 million for STD Education and Prevention -- Recent government expenditures in this area include
· a transgender beauty pageant in San Francisco that advertised available HIV testing and

· an event called "Got Love? - Flirt/Date/Score" that taught participants how "to flirt with greater finesse."

$83 billion for the earned income credit for people who don't pay income tax. SOURCE Wall Street Journal

$4.19 billion open to ACORN. The Pelosi-Reid bill makes groups like ACORN eligible for a $4.19 billion pot of money for "neighborhood stabilization activities."

MISCELLANEOUS PORK

Some of the biggest winners in the package are federal agencies and Congressional relatives:

$2 Billion for national parks. "A top House Republican is demanding an investigation into whether the more than $2 billion for national parks in the House stimulus package is proper in light of the fact that the chief lobbyist for the National Parks Conservation Association is the son of House Appropriations Committee Chairman David R. Obey (chief author of the bill.)" Stephen Dinan and S.A. Miller, "Stimulus has plum for Lawmakers Son," Washington Times, January 29, 2009.

$54 billion will go to federal programs that the Office of Management and Budget or the Government Accountability Office have already criticized as "ineffective" or unable to pass basic financial audits. SOURCE Wall Street Journal

$1.2 billion to the National Science Foundation (Page 46) "Chuck Grassley knows it when he sees it. The "it," of course, is pornography. And Grassley has seen it deep in a demurely titled section of a report from the National Science Foundation -- a report that says NSF employees have been spending significant amounts of company time on smut sites and in other explicit pursuits . . . In one particularly egregious case, the report says one NSF "senior official" was discovered to have spent as much as 20 percent of his working hours over a two-year interval 'viewing sexually explicit images and engaging in sexually explicit online 'chats' with various women.' Investigators calculated the value of the time lost at more than $58,000 -- for that employee alone." Andie Coller, "Grassley Launchers Porn Inquiry," Politico, January 29, 2009.

TAKE ACTION

Please call both of your U.S. Senators and find out where they intend to vote on the Stimulus bill. Express you concerns about this terrible bill and urge them to vote against the Stimulus Package. Click on Democrats/Republicans for a phone list of U.S. Senators.