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Posts Tagged ‘Tax Dollars’

Unfortunately, happy birthday.

Wonder what you would find if you frisked what went on in Washington D.C. one year ago today?

Answer: President Obama signed the record $787 billion Democratic Stimulus Bill.

Of course that price tag has increased to $862 billion since then. Figures… When does the federal government (including the CBO) ever calculate their predictions correctly?

Over a year ago, President Obama promised America that he would create (not save) 3.5 million jobs by the end of 2010. The result: We have lost almost 3 million jobs. It is baffling to hear the President give so many altered messages relating to how the stimulus package has been a success. You can get an idea of what I am talking about by watching the video posted above.

Hey, remember when President Obama and his administration promised this:

Granted, the unemployment rate now stands at 9.7 percent, but the only reason it is not even higher is that millions of Americans have left the workforce altogether.

But enough with the negatives! Let’s look at the bright side… At least none of the stimulus money is being wasted. Wait a minute:

And last, but not least:

Please don’t make me continue…

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY STIMULUS PACKAGE!

*UPDATE* – February 18, 2010

House Republican Whip Eric Cantor released an interesting stimulus package  timeline (PDF) and here are just a few of the ‘shaky’ milestones chosen by Karl from Hot Air:

  • February 17, 2009: The nation’s first Recovery Act project is announced, a new bridge in Tuscumbia, MO. CNN later reports on “A New ‘Bridge to Nowhere’.”
  • April 13, 2009:The Administration announces the 2,000th Recovery Act project, but an ABC News fact check reveals that far fewer projects are actually underway, and may not come in under budget as claimed.
  • May 27, 2009: President Obama marks the 100 day anniversary of the Recovery Act by claiming that 150,000 jobs have been saved or created. Politifact calls this “not much better than a guess presented as a fact.”
  • July 27, 2009: Congressional Democrats claim highway and transit spending from the stimulus has created or sustained 48,000 jobs. ProPublica says “the estimate suffers from what’s become a common malaise in the stimulus world: fuzzy math.” ProPublica found “a reliance on raw head counts — which tend to inflate the numbers by giving full- and part-time jobs the same weight — and by counting the same workers two, three or four times.”
  • October 15, 2009: The administration announces that contracts awarded with Recovery Act funds have created or saved 30,383 jobs. The Associated Press found “some counts were more than 10 times as high as the actual number of jobs; some jobs credited to the stimulus program were counted two and sometimes more than four times; and other jobs were credited to stimulus spending when none was produced.”
  • October 30, 2009: The administration announces that the Recovery Act has saved or created 640,329 total jobs. On November 19, the Administration admits that they cannot confirm their claim.
  • December 18, 2009: The Administration sends out a memo saying they will no longer count jobs “created or saved,” but instead count jobs funded in whole or in part by the Recovery Act. But they brought it back in the most recent report from Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers.

Can someone say: P.R. disaster?

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U.S. Census Super Bowl Ad.

Wonder what you would find if you frisked last night’s Super Bowl commercials?

Answer: A bunch of your tax dollars wasted on a U.S. Census advertisement.

Since Americans are hurting all over the country and being forced to tighten their belts, you might wonder how much our government actually spent on their 30 second ad spot. Eh… Not much, only a few million:

Taxpayers might want to pay close attention to this Sunday’s Super Bowl broadcast or they’ll miss Uncle Sam’s 30-second, $2.5-million reminder to stand up and be counted.

That’s what the Census Bureau paid CBS to get their message notched somewhere between a National Lampoon reprisal, a weird dude with big glasses, a beer-can house and men without pants.

And, that’s just a fraction of what the bureau plans to spend this year to get Americans to answer a simple, 10-question survey.

The bureau is spending $133 million between January and May — or, more than $13 million for each of 10 questions, one of which reads: What is your telephone number? — to publicize the national head-count. Part of that effort is the Super Bowl ad, which Kendall Johnson, a spokeswoman for the bureau, confirmed Wednesday to FoxNews.com cost $2.5 million to air. The ad, produced by actor and director Christopher Guest, also will appear in other media, Johnson said.

What makes this waste of money worse is the fact that the advertisement didn’t even make the top 25 Annual Super Bowl Ad Meter List. It only ranked 52nd. Congratulations federal government! Once again, your inefficient at performing ANOTHER task: advertising effectively.

Hmm? Perhaps taxpayer money should be spent more wisely and a lot less often, especially for advertising… But maybe that’s just me?

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Wonder what you would find if you frisked House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and her family?

Answer: Apparently, she has been using military aircrafts to taxi her kids and grand kids across the country without any U.S. Representatives on board.

Absolutely wonderful… Wasteful government spending and abuse of power at its finest. FOX Nation reports:

Using Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, Judicial Watch uncovered thousands of pages of travel documents related to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s use of military aircraft.

What hasn’t been revealed so far is that military aircraft are being used to shuttle Pelosi’s kids and grandkids between DC and San Francisco without any Congressional representatives even onboard! Put simply, the United States Air Force is serving as a multi-billion dollar chauffeur- and baby-sitting service for Nancy Pelosi’s kids and grandkids — presumably because commercial travel is beneath the families of the autocrats.

Click here to check out copies of the report.

*Waving* Goodbye taxpayer dollars. Hopefully the Speaker’s children and grandchildren enjoyed their vacations. After all, she is only a millionaire and might be spending beyond her means if she bought them commercial airline tickets, haha. Typical liberal… Who’s the real “fat-cat” now?

We must demand our money back!

Side-Note: Click here to check out Nancy Pelosi’s 200 seat USAF C-32, Boeing  757… Yeah, I bet she is feeling the pain of everyday Americans.

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Wonder what you would find if you frisked President Obama’s stimulus package?

Answer: A half a million dollar grant awarded to Penn State Professor Michael Mann.

Wonderful… Michael Mann – creator of the famous hockey stick graph – is one of the biggest climate change scientists who were implicated in the global warming email conspiracy known as Climate-Gate. With that said, it’s quite embarrassing to find out what he was awarded with using the $787 billion stimulus package:

In the face of rising unemployment and record-breaking deficits, policy experts at the National Center for Public Policy Research are criticizing the Obama Administration for awarding a half million dollar grant from the economic stimulus package to Penn State Professor Michael Mann, a key figure in the Climategate controversy.

[...]

Professor Mann is currently under investigation by Penn State University because of activities related to a closed circle of climate scientists who appear to have been engaged in agenda-driven science.  Emails and documents mysteriously released from the previously-prestigious Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom revealed discussions of manipulation and destruction of research data, as well as efforts to interfere with the peer review process to stifle opposing views.  The motivation underlying these efforts appears to be a coordinated strategy to support the belief that mankind’s activities are causing global warming.

“It’s no wonder that Obama’s stimulus plan is failing to produce jobs.  Taxpayer dollars aren’t being used in the ways most likely to spur job creation.  The stimulus was not sold to the public as a way to reward a loyalist in the climate change debate.  Nor was the stimulus sold as a way to promote the Obama Administration’s position on the global warming theory.  This misuse of stimulus money illustrates why tax cuts are a better way to stimulate the economy than letting the government decide where to spend taxpayer dollars.  As is often the case, political considerations corrupt the distribution of government funds,” said Deneen Borelli, a fellow with the National Center’s Project 21 black leadership network.

Ugh… Since I started paying attention to politics, it’s so damn frustrating to wake up everyday to realize how Washington D.C. is spending our money so inefficiently… Again and again and again. Hmm… How I wonder how many jobs Mr. Mann planned on ‘creating’ with that large chunk of change? HA! That question is almost laughable.

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NPR's 'Tea Bag' video.

Wonder what you would find if you frisked National Public Radio?

Answer: They used taxpayer dollars to promote a Tea Party bashing video.

I just saw this video on Gateway Pundit and figured I would throw on my blog.

Way to stay classy NPR:roll: Once again, the liberals are out and about looking to exercise their main strategy against the opposition:

A prime example of radical socialist Saul Alinksy’s Rule #5 (Ridicule) is featured prominently on NPR’s website — in the form of a flash animation titled “Learn To Speak Tea Bag” — which ridicules tea partiers, pro-lifers, opponents of the Democrat Party’s health care reform, and more specifically, three Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives (John Boehner, Eric Cantor and Michele Bachmann).

[...]

The Bottom Line: NPR is using taxpayer money to call those who have participated in Tea party events and their supporters idiots. With the liberal Democrats in Congress in charge of NPR’s purse strings, those who make NPR’s decisions have calculated that they can get away with it scot-free.

If you would like to see the screenshot of this video posted on NPR’s website, click here.

Jim Hoft (from Gateway Pundit) made a great point about the video’s stance on Republican campaign donations:

The video bashes Republican Representatives who took donations from insurance or pharmaceutical companies but totally ignores the seedy Chicago style backroom deals made and bribes offered by democrats to get their massive takeover of the health care industry rammed through Congress.

If you would like to know the details about all of the Democrat’s shady/backroom deals regarding Obama-Care, click here.

Side-Note: Honestly, it’s time to retire the term “teabagger.” It’s truly derogatory and disrespectful. The correct term is Tea Partier… meaning ‘Taxed Enough Already.’

Mark Fiore – from San Francisco – created this video… Shocking! Haha.

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Wonder what you would find if you frisked President Obama’s $787 billion stimulus package?

Answer: A ton of taxpayer money was spent in nonexistent zip codes.

You have got to be kidding me… First it was $6.4 BILLION of the stimulus package going to nonexistent congressional districts and now it’s come to this:

The agency charged with tracking the stimulus funds, the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, attempted to eliminate this embarrassment by lumping all the billions reported going to nonexistent Congressional districts into a new category called the “unassigned” Congressional district.

Closer examination of the latest recovery.gov report for New Mexico shows hundreds of thousands of dollars sent to and credited with creating jobs in zip codes that do not exist in New Mexico or anywhere else. Moreover, funds reported as being spent in New Mexico were given zip codes corresponding to areas in Washington and Oregon.

The recovery.gov site reports that $373,874 was spent in zip code 97052. Unfortunately, this expenditure created zip jobs. But $36,218 was credited with creating 5 jobs in zip code 87258. A cool hundred grand went into zip code 86705, but didn’t result in even one person finding work.

None of these zip codes exist in New Mexico, or anywhere else, for that matter.

Truly impressive. Everyone should take a quick second right now and give the United States government a round of applause for spending $18 million of taxpayer money on an internet database that is STILL full of garbage entries.

Like I have said before… How many examples of government failed programs/entitlements do you need in order for a liberal to realize that maybe the government running health-care isn’t such a good idea after all? Or anything at all?

Side-Note: I realize this story is related to zip codes, but it reminds me of Ludacris’ hit single “Area Codes” featuring Nate Dogg :lol: :

Hmm… Do I sense a political/conservative remix coming?

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Wonder what you would find if you frisked House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the rest of Congress’s wasteful spending of taxpayer money?

Answer: $2,993 on flowers and more…

Bravo Ms. Pelosi! If there’s one thing government knows how to do, it’s wasting our hard earned money on useless things. My case and point:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) spent $2,993 in taxpayer money on flowers between June and October. [...]

These expenditures – culled from thousands of line items released Monday by the Chief Administrative Officer of the House – are just a fraction of the $300 million spent last quarter by House offices. But while the bulk of congressional office spending goes to salaries and routine office expenses, some of the line items offer a window into the personalities and priorities of each congressional office.

Pelosi, who has come under fire in the past for spending on flowers, also spent roughly $30,610 in food and beverage and about $2,740 on bottled water, contributing to the nearly $120,531 total from all congressional leadership accounts. Her offices defended the charges, saying the Speaker’s office holds more ceremonial events with visiting dignitaries than other congressional offices. They also use a local florist, and about a third of her flower expenses this quarter were for Jack Kemp’s funeral.

Lawmakers appear to have great flexibility on what qualifies as an office expense. Money is spent on everything from security services for district offices to thousands in mileage reimbursements for individuals’ cars. Taxpayers foot the bill for leasing cars for members, including cars for Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.) and Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas).

Hmm… Lawmakers keep telling us we’re in a recession, while they themselves don’t act like it. A majority of Americans are tightening their belts while our politicians in Washington are spending money like there’s an infinite amount. Oh wait… That’s because we don’t have any money left and we’re using ‘imaginary’ money. It’s simple: Government spends while it makes its own rules. Therefore, government is inefficient and should never be competing or taking over the private sector. (Cough*Health-Care*Cough)

Side-Note: Remember folks! The next time you take a tour of Washington D.C. and come across Nancy Pelosi’s office, take a flower. After all, you helped pay for them.

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