©Lone Star Diary
By Murray Montgomery
It seems that Americans are being asked more and more these days to “tighten their belts.” In other words we are told that, in these bad economic times, we should be careful how we spend our money and not be frivolous with it.
When in fact, many ordinary citizens are currently doing all they can to survive and many of them do good just to get by these days without being the least bit frivolous.
It’s outrageous that the feds tell us to watch what we spend while they take our hard earned tax dollars and spend them on some mighty ridiculous things.
Not long ago, Congress passed a so-called stimulus bill that was supposed to do great things towards reviving the economy. But so far, it doesn’t seem to be doing much to ease the financial pain of our citizens or the thousands of small businesses across the country.
I don’t claim to be an economic expert, but when I see how some of this money is being spent, it certainly makes me doubt the mindset of the people doing the spending. As a matter of fact, it makes me downright angry.
Recently two members of Congress released a new report which they named “Summertime Blues: 100 Stimulus Projects that Give Taxpayers the Blues.”
U.S. Senators Tom Coburn, M.D. (R-OK) and John McCain (R-AZ) wrote this report.
Now I realize that both of these men are Republicans but the contents of their article are available for all to see online at Coburn’s website. According to Coburn and McCain, it contains examples of the stimulus project that are both wasteful and unsuccessful in creating jobs.
All politicians, Republican or Democrat, will argue for or against the stimulus bill depending on which side they happen to be, but when facts are presented; it’s up to the people to decide if they think their tax dollars are being spent with some sort of wisdom and common sense.
After reading the report, and seeing the examples of ridiculous spending, I felt compelled to share it with you in this column.
I’ve picked out a few that will give you some idea of where your hard-earned dollars are going. Let’s start with the $1.9 million that will be spent on international ant research. Well, I have ants and all I need to know is how to get rid of them – I can find that out at the local hardware store and it probably isn’t going to cost more than five or six bucks.
Here are a few more: $554,763 is going to the Forest Service to replace windows in a closed visitor’s center at Mount St. Helens; $200,000 will be sent to communities in Siberia to help them lobby Russian policy makers; $760,000 is going to Georgia Tech so they can study improvised music.
I was under the impression that this stimulus money was supposed to help folks in the United States – so why are they spending $529,648 to study the effects of local populations on the environment…in the Himalayas? And why are they spending $456,663 to study the circulation of Neptune’s atmosphere?
These are just a few examples of how our money is being spent. I’m wondering why all these funds can’t be put towards Social Security or perhaps better border security. Maybe we could use it to feed the thousands of hungry people right here in America.
I use the word “unbelievable” a lot, but that’s the way I feel when I see what corrupt politicians are doing to this country, and all the while thumbing their noses at the people who they’re supposed to serve.
In my opinion, it makes no difference what political party happens to be in power – there is corruption on both sides of the aisle. We need to make every effort to elect honest, patriotic people who have some common sense; and we need to demand term limits for members of Congress.
Maybe when Americans become more informed and involved in politics, from the local level all the way to the top, perhaps we won’t be spending $700,000 to study why monkeys respond negatively to inequity. Yep, that’s also in the stimulus bill.