Monday, January 26, 2009

What Have They Done: Part Two

Okay, so the intellectual giants with the sensibilities of a pachyderm running Wall Street have used Tarp money to redecorate offices, buy luxury planes, hand out bonuses.... Am I missing something?

On the political front, it's even worse. Over at Pumpkin Seeds, Mrs. Calabaza put it all together for us. To paraphrase, the guy running the IRS didn't pay his taxes; Barney Frank on whose watch Fannie and Freddie imploded all the while he was reassuring the public is still in charge; Dodd who was the recipient of a sweetheart deal himself overseeing mortgages. And let's not forget Charlie Rangel. Despite the peccadillo of the week, the man remains ensconced as Chair of the Ways and Means committee. What happened to accountability? Who votes for these people? Further, what does it bode when this cast of unseemly characters is in charge of crafting the bailout?

I'll tell you what happens. Amongst the choice morsels of the stimulus that I've heard:

6 billion for the arts. How many jobs are they going to create? Is is ethical to saddle my grandchildren with the cost of attending La Traviata in the park?

4.6 billion for housing organizations, read Acorn, perhaps?

Hundreds of millions for birth control, if Pelosi gets her way. It's cheaper, she says.

On the local level, one of the beneficiaries mentioned is a local science research center which employs about two people and is staffed by a host of volunteers. How many are they going to hire, I ask?

I've read that each one of the jobs created will cost about 235 thousand dollars. Heck, just mail 20 thousand dollars to ten people and multiply the effect by 10 and save administrative costs. Well, as Mr. Obama pointed out in all graciousness, "I won." He and this addle pated congress would do well to remember that almost half of the electorate did not vote for him. Two years is not that long. Ask Bill Clinton.

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