Socialized Insanity

“Uncle Sam is on the Pipe!” – Chris Rock, Comedian

In normal everyday life two percent does not constitute a significant number.  Most people tend not to look twice at such a small percentage.  After all, for two percent of something to matter the other 98 percent would have to be quite significant, like say 3,040,000,000,000.  In this case I am referring to the 2009 United States Federal Budget.  The total requested budget is 3.1 trillion dollars and the two percent I was referring to is the percentage of it that is going to go towards earmarks.

Earmarks are pet projects, or better known as “Pork Spending”.  This is money that people in Congress steer back to their constituents as a way of saying “Thanks for your vote/money, don’t forget I have to run again soon.”  Everyone who followed the recent Presidential race should be well versed on this trend seeing as it became a major hot button issue throughout the campaign.  The talk about them died out following the election but thanks to Congress just not being able to help themselves the issue was raised again after the recent passage of the new Omnibus Spending bill passed this past week.  It includes over 9,000 of these earmarks and the total bill is over 400 billion dollars.

Many members of Congress and some in the media have brought attention to the appalling nature of this bill and its earmarks, but it seems that just as many have popped up to defend it stating that pork spending coverage is overblown, I mean it only represents two percent of the federal budget, so who cares?  I wish that I were making this up.  Educated, elected people have gone on record making two percent of the federal budget seem insignificant.  Well the phrase “two percent” does sound insignificant, so let me put it another way, “60,000,000,000 dollars!”

When you go on TV and say that two percent is nothing you don’t tend to sound stupid, but saying 60 billion dollars is nothing will make anyone sound like a lunatic.  That however is how Congress is acting, like lunatics.  Does anyone know what we could do with 60 billion dollars?  NO, YOU DON’T, BECAUSE IT’S 60 BILLION DOLLARS!  Only people in government can call that insignificant with a straight face.

Now many of the earmarks I am referring to will go to pay for various scientific studies of such things as Mormon Crickets (I swear to God) along with other very specialized projects.  Now I am aware some people would call my rant against spending federal tax dollars on these projects anti-science, and nothing can be further from the truth.  I love science, I don’t understand any of it, but I am fascinated by it.  I have degrees in Political Science and Economics so I spent little time in a science lab but I fully understand the need for scientific discovery.  I simply don’t want the federal government in charge of it.

I want the government as far away from science as possible.  I do not believe that anyone in Congress is smart enough to be in charge of a high school science closet let alone a laboratory.  The government’s job in regards to science is to get out of its way.  I was fully in favor of President Obama’s recent repeal of President Bush’s ban on stem cell research.  This has nothing to do with my moral beliefs on the subject, just my belief that the government does not have the right to set any kind of moral code for the rest of us.

My problem with spending 60 billion on fringe projects like the study of crickets is that we have a few major problems in this country and that money should be spent wiser.  We have a failing educational system, it is overcrowded and underfunded.  We are fighting two major military actions around the world; anyone need more body armor over there?  Our Social Security system is failing and will be bankrupt long before I will retire at its current rate.  We are in real need for serious infrastructure rejuvenation across the nation.  We need to revamp our power grid and drastically improve roads and bridges.  Oh by the way, we are also 9 trillion in debt.

Let me put two percent in different terms; assume you live in a household that makes 50 thousand dollars a year.  Now also assume that your debt is three times your annual income.  You can barely afford to make the interest payments on your debt while at the same time buying food and paying for cello lessons.  Now assume your spouse decides to take just two percent of your money and spend it on scratch lotto tickets.  That’s $1,000 just gone down the drain.  Now you might be upset, but hey, it’s only two percent of your money, no big deal, right?

Look, if we were in a position where we had no federal debt, a fully funded and smoothly running education system, perfect infrastructure, a military that could outfit all of its needs, a Social Security system that was self sufficient, and basically no other pressing needs and still had 60 billion dollars just lying around, then go ahead and spend it however you damn well please.  Sadly that is not the case.  We have serious needs in this country right now.  We are going through some rough economics and in an age like this how can anyone listen to someone call 60 billion dollars insignificant and not want to scream?  All I ask is people take a real look at the cost of how our government is doing business and realize that we only get the government that we deserve, and that every couple of years in November we get the chance to overthrow it.