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Below is just a short list of some of the earmarks, or pork barrel projects that have been added to our so-called economic stimulus package.
This doesn't include the several million to go to planting new grass around the Jefferson Memorial.....or the 200 million going to the Endowment for the Arts. There's more pork items but it's not necessary to list them all here....you get the idea.

Most people are under the impression that Barack Obama drafted this bill.....not so; it was Nancy Pelosi, our current Speaker of the House. This is her baby and these projects are pets that liberals have been wanting to do for years. I see where liberals are acting as if Republicans are being pouty by not signing onto this ridiculous bill. If liberals wanted to tell the truth, which they won't, because they want American's to believe that they're getting the job done, they'd tell you that Nancy Pelosi did not include any Republicans when drafting the bill, because she knew they wouldn't go for it. And they're showing their solidarity and understanding that this bill will in no way create jobs.....nor will it stimulate the eonomy.

So President Obama skips off to the Hill to meet with House Republicans, ostensibly to talk them into signing onto this bill and tout it's greatness and how successful it can be. It was rather more of a chat and a photo-op to make it look like he's following through on one of his campaign promises to end the era of partisanship. He knew going into this whole thing that he doesn't need any Republican votes.....since the House and the Senate control both sides, who cares.

However.....liberal Democrats know that America is watching, and we're finding out more and more about how this package will fail miserably. It may be that these earmarks by themselves are a good thing and perhaps important items that need funding. But as they are now they're only a hindrance to the whole purpose of the bill. There aren't any pundits, or strategists, or economic advisers in their right minds that think this bill will work. Even some right minded liberals agree and didn't vote for the bill.

Also, one of the things that I find somewhat disturbing about this whole deal is that Obama is standing behind it. And this comes after all of his campaign promises of ending pork barrel projects such as this, ending lobbyist control and etc. In order to maintain these big promises he should have rejected the bill out of hand, and ordered that moonbat Pelosi to rewrite the bill sans the pork barrel, or porkulus crap, and get Republicans involved. But she and other liberals are scared to death of more tax cuts, they don't want things to work. And they remember when Ronald Reagan took the helm after Jimmy Carter's reign of terror, and introduced massive tax cuts, which revived the then failing economy.....which many people believe was a much worse, so-called recession than what we're experiencing now. We were brought back to life thanks to Reagan and could be now if only liberals would see the light!

I'll say this again.....I'm willing to give Barack Obama a chance. After all it's only been a few weeks, but we have four years to go and the first two things he's signed as an executive order don't look good at all. One is closing Guantanamo Bay with no real plan as to where he intends on housing the remaining 240 terrorist prisoners, and two, this economic stimulus package. Well....lets just see what happens. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid should take a real dive after this miserable failure, and even though Obama's carrying a 70% approval rating, Congress is still at a dismal 13% approval rating. Get with the program libs!!
______________________________________________

$20 million "for the removal of small- to medium-sized fish passage barriers." (Pg. 45 of Senate Appropriations Committee report: "20,000,000 for the removal of small- to medium-sized fish passage barriers)

$400 million for STD prevention (Pg. 60 of Senate Appropriations Committee report: "CDC estimates that a proximately 19 million new STD infections occur annually in the United States ...The Committee has included $400,000,000 for testing and prevention of these conditions.")

$25 million to rehabilitate off-roading (ATV) trails (Pg. 45 of Senate Appropriations Committee report: "$25,000,000 is for recreation maintenance, especially for rehabilitation of off-road vehicle routes, and $20,000,000 is for trail maintenance and restoration")

$34 million to remodel the Department of Commerce HQ (Pg. 15 of Senate Appropriations Committee report: $34,000,000 for the Department of Commerce renovation and modernization")

Comments (22) | Add Comment | Link

At 06:50, January 31, 2009, littleMissConfused said:
	Sooooo How exactly are those things supposed to help the average American? I hope they pull there head out of their ass soon and do something useful..... Don't care about fish, don't have an ATV and even if I did have an STD...I no longer have health insurance to go to a doctor to do anything about it! Add Comment \| Link \| \|

At 07:33, January 31, 2009, DeeJay said:
	Sadly, no matter what happens there are always going to be people tacking crap onto bills. I hope they can take out some of the things that are goofy and stick to items that will help the economy. Overall, I am glad that at least someone has the balls to try to do something to fix the miserable state that our economy has been allowed to lapse into. Add Comment \| Link \| \|

At 08:15, February 1, 2009, Rubicon said:

LMC.....oh don't worry, the Dems are working on some sort of national health care program, and as soon as they can figure out something that works you'll be covered.

Deej.....if you're referring to Obama with the balls to do something we'll just have to see. Like I said, he's signed off on this bill even though he has to know that American's aren't happy about all the pork added in. If it fails, and most people think it will.....he'll be the one taking all the blame for it.

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At 12:30, February 1, 2009, indigomoonarts said:
	Well I DO care about Fish and I do care about STD prevention since I work with kids right at that age. And I do care that trails are restored!!!!!!! The second to least amount being spent here is on the remodel. Usually it's the MOST being spent in the past!! Add Comment \| Link \| \|

At 02:05, February 1, 2009, Eclectablog said:

If you want to create jobs, one very solid way to do that is build and repair infrastructure and maintaining things like our national parks is part of that.

By the way, all of these things you complain about add up to $479 million. That amounts to, get this:

<0.06% of the total $800,000,000,000 bill.

You are ranting and raving and condemning a stimulus package because of a tiny fraction of 1% of the spending in it.

That's lame, dude.

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At 03:04, February 1, 2009, Eclectablog said:
	Here's something you might find interesting: Money spent in the national parks has a 4 for 1 return in terms of revenues returned back into the economy. In other words, spend $1 million in fixing the national parks, get $4 million in additional revenues from the users of the national parks. (Source: National Parks Conservation Association [NPCA]) Add Comment \| Link \| \|

At 07:03, February 2, 2009, Eclectablog said:

Oh, and that $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts? Another good investment:

Every year nonprofit arts organizations generate $166.2 billion in economic activity, support 5.7 million jobs, and send almost $30 billion back to government, according to Americans for the Arts. There is hardly a person more likely to go out and spend her stimulus check than a starving artist.

(Source: The Atlantic Monthly)

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At 09:20, February 2, 2009, Aielman said:

You are ranting and raving and condemning a stimulus package because of a tiny fraction of 1% of the spending in it.

Well how about we take a look at some more percentage points. There's $1 billion for Amtrak, the federal railroad that hasn't turned a profit in 40 years. $2 billion for child-care subsidies, which aren't going to stimulate much of anything. $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts, certainly a huge force for job creation. You've got $400 million for global-warming research and another $2.4 billion for carbon-capture demonstration projects. There's even $650 million on top of the billions already doled out to pay for digital TV conversion coupons.

What the fuck are these supposed to do to stimulate the economy again?

Much of the projected spending will go to things like the $8 billion for renewable energy funding and $6 billion for mass transit, both of which have very low or negative return on investment. Almost all US urban transit systems are so badly managed that their fares cover less than half of their costs. But then again, the people who operate these systems belong to public-employee unions that are campaign contributors to guess which party?

Another "stimulus" aspect of this bill is the roughly $252 billion is for income-transfer payments. These aren't investments that arguably help everyone, but cash or benefits to individuals for doing nothing at all. There's $81 billion for Medicaid, $36 billion for expanded unemployment benefits, $20 billion for food stamps, and $83 billion for the earned income credit for people who don't pay income tax.

So now we're up to about $270 billion of crap that isn't going to stimulate a thing.

Obama has said this bill will make "dramatic investments to revive our flagging economy."

Well less than 5% of the spending in the bill, around $30 billion, is for fixing bridges or other highway projects. There's $40 billion more for broadband and energy grid development, as well as airport improvement/expansions and clean water projects that are arguably worthwhile priorities, and none of which are going to be able to even be started for at least a year due to the nature of the projects and the legal requirements for bidding for those projects.

Then you can throw in $20 billion for business tax cuts, and you get around $90 billion that's going to stimulate much of anything. That's about $.12 out of every $1 of the $825 billion that could plausibly cause any growth.

I'm not seeing the dramatic growth he's talking about in these numbers. What I'm seeing is a Democratic party's wish list of projects for the last 4 decades or so.

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At 10:13, February 2, 2009, Eclectablog said:

What the fuck are these supposed to do to stimulate the economy again?

Most of us refer to those things as "investment". If you're suggesting that because mass transit hasn't ever been done well before that we should just scrap it, I couldn't possibly disagree more. All of this investment money goes directly into the economy thus "stimulating" it. Get it? Stimulus package? Stimulating the economy? These aren't tax breaks to the uber-wealthy. This is money being spent to employ real people with real wages that they turn around and spend on real goods and real services.

So now we're up to about $270 billion of crap that isn't going to stimulate a thing.

Right, except for a $270 billion cash infusion into our economy in a way that actually helps people who need it most: those who have lost their jobs. *rolls eyes*

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At 12:01, February 2, 2009, Aielman said:

Most of us refer to those things as "investment". If you're suggesting that because mass transit hasn't ever been done well before that we should just scrap it, I couldn't possibly disagree more.

I suggested no such thing. I suggested that a stimulus package actually provide stimulus. Dumping money into mass transit isn't going to do so. It's a waste of money to appease union special interests. That money does nothing to entice people to start spending again, nor will it do anything to get banks to free up some credit, which is what really needs to be done to stimulate the economy.

This is money being spent to employ real people with real wages that they turn around and spend on real goods and real services.

Sure...at about a cost of about $150k per job. Jobs which for the most part will be low skill, low pay labor. That's not an effective way to stimulate the economy. We end up bankrupting our grandchildren for a few jobs that aren't going to be enough to get the ball rolling on anything. And this isn't just a guess...it's been proven with the New Deal that these types of infrastructure expenditures, while nice, do fuck all for stimulating the economy.

This recession is about a lack of credit. Paying more money so bus companies can piss it away isn't going to free up the credit market to get investment rolling again.

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At 12:56, February 2, 2009, Eclectablog said:

Dumping money into mass transit isn't going to do so. It's a waste of money to appease union special interests. That money does nothing to entice people to start spending again, nor will it do anything to get banks to free up some credit, which is what really needs to be done to stimulate the economy.

It's no such thing. Many of us in this country have been clamoring for investment in mass transit for decades and this is a three-fer: inject money into the economy, put people to work AND invest in mass transit infrastructure. Getting credit flowing again is a separate issue from a monetary stimulus package, I'd argue.

This recession is about a lack of credit.

Many would argue otherwise. If you're out of a job, lack of credit is the least of your problems... Consumer confidence, fixing the housing crisis, and sorting out the mess bankers and investment houses have made of things are right up there with credit flow in my opinion. Democrats rightly see investing in the things that will make us stronger in the long term as a win-win situation for the country.

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At 02:46, February 2, 2009, Rubicon said:

"You are ranting and raving and condemning a stimulus package because of a tiny fraction of 1% of the spending in it.
That's lame, dude."

Not so.....there is nothing lame about this post, and nothing lame about when facts are facts.

"build and repair infrastructure"

On this we would agree, and I would "argue" that this should remain written into this bill. And while some of these other earmarks may be worth while....now is just simply not the time! American's do not want to hear about useless pork right now. None of your facts and figures truly support a hastened economic stimulus.
And wasn't that Barack Obama, in making his campaign promises promised to end frivolous and useless earmarks?
What happened to that?

If Republicans hadn't stood up to the House for what is right....in other words unified and stuck to their guns, this bill would have easily passed and be on it's way to implementation. And be on it's way to more failures, and our taxes increased in order to pay for something that was supposed to help us.
We're going to get our taxes raised anyway because we had to give money, and now more money to banks and Wall Street because they cannot govern or regulate themselves effectively.

Obama would have signed off on this bill and Pelosi, Reid, and all of the other uber-liberals would be dancing in the streets because they finally would've gotten things that they've wanted for a long time. And dance with absolutely no regard to the consequences of their actions, or how negatively it will impact and effect the American people.

And while Obama wants American's to see his efforts toward bi-partisanship, knowing that he doesn't need Republican votes or support, and knowing that he does not govern or preside over the House and Senate, he is not doing near enough to chastise his party and it's leaders and make it clear that, according to his promises, he's going to bring about change in Washington....his party leaders need to get on board and get with the program.

"If you're out of a job, lack of credit is the least of your problems..."

Actually....credit checks are becoming a pretty big deal in background checks when applying for jobs, especially if the job has you dealing with money, or in it's proximity. So many of the people being foreclosed on are now realizing that their credit is shooting down the tubes. So much for "infusion" or "investments".

"Democrats rightly see investing in the things that will make us stronger in the long term as a win-win situation for the country."

I believe that most American's are not looking in the long term right now.....more like, as in the banks, automakers, Wall Street, Fannie May and Freddie Mack etc, they're looking for what's going to stimulate this economy quicker and effectively. The items I posted here, and others mentioned, have nothing to do with quick and effective. In other words.....and again, while they might be worth while projects, now is just not the time to be funding them, and American's are getting angrier and angrier with every passing day that we hear more about what the Democrats are doing with the economic stimulus package.

It's fine if you support this bill, but surely you must see the terrible flaws in it, and the ultra-poor timing of the earmarks.

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At 03:30, February 2, 2009, Eclectablog said:

There are no earmarks in this bill (LINK.) President Obama has said from the beginning they wouldn't contain earmarks as has Nancy Pelosi and Vice President Biden. And I DO think it's lame when the Republicans will stand in the way of putting this country back on its feet due to a tiny fraction of 1% of the total package that they have managed to find a problem with. It's petty partisanship and most American citizens know that.

Actually....credit checks are becoming a pretty big deal in background checks when applying for jobs

That may be so but that has nothing to do with the flow of credit or this bill.

American's are getting angrier and angrier with every passing day that we hear more about what the Democrats are doing with the economic stimulus package.

Correction: Republicans are getting angrier and angrier and it's because their party's leadership is making a huge issue out of a tiny fraction of 1% of the spending in the bill. Most Americans are getting angry, it's true: they're getting angry at obstructionist Republicans who are more interested in petty partisan politics than they are fixing what's wrong with our economy.

This bill is full of tax cuts, infrastructure investments and other bipartisan ideas that were contributed to by Congesspeople from both sides of the aisle. They asked for things, got some of them, and then still chose to walk away from the table. Lame.

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At 04:16, February 2, 2009, Aielman said:

Many would argue otherwise. If you're out of a job, lack of credit is the least of your problems...

Yes...and many don't know fuck all about how the economy works. For the most part, if you're out of a job, it's a direct result of the credit crunch. If companies can't get credit to meet payroll from ongoing credit lines, and can't expand, then the economy stagnates. Unemployment was a lagging indicator for this recession. And while the numbers are the worst they've been in years, they're still not anywhere near depression era levels, which is where all this new deal crap was tried and failed the first time.

Consumer confidence, fixing the housing crisis, and sorting out the mess bankers and investment houses have made of things are right up there with credit flow in my opinion.

Consumer confidence will go up when the press stops telling them it's the end of the world. The housing crisis was $300 billion, and had nothing to do with the failure of the banking industry. $300 billion is a drop in the bucket compared to the $15 trillion of debt tied up in the collapse of the derivatives market.

Democrats rightly see investing in the things that will make us stronger in the long term as a win-win situation for the country.

The only thing the democrats are rightly seeing is the opportunity to get 4 decades worth of shit passed without much of any opposition. These are the same dumbasses, along with their republican counterparts, that got us into the mess in the first place, and they didn't suddenly become financial geniuses in the last 6 months.

Correction: Republicans are getting angrier and angrier and it's because their party's leadership is making a huge issue out of a tiny fraction of 1% of the spending in the bill

Wrong. Anyone who knows anything about economics and finances is quite concerned because neither party seems to have a fucking clue, and because the democrats are trying to push a stimulus package in which 60% of the debt it will incur will do little to nothing to stimulate the economy either in the short term or the long term.

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At 05:41, February 2, 2009, Rubicon said:

#The Stimulus Will Not Work
________________________
"Our history is replete with examples of “stimulus” spending failing to move our economy toward prosperity—Bush just tried it, Ford tried it. Even Christina Romer, Obama’s Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers agrees. Romer wrote in a study, "Our estimates suggest that fiscal actions contributed only moderately to recoveries." The New Deal didn’t end the Great Depression and Obama’s stimulus package won’t end this recession. In fact, two UCLA economists published a study in 2004 finding FDR’s similar New Deal policies prolonged the Great Depression by seven years.

It fails because you don’t increase economic output by taking a dollar from one person and giving to another. The idea of “stimulus” spending falls for the “broken window fallacy”—the allure of what is seen versus what is not seen. We will see the jobs created by the government spending. What we won’t see are the jobs lost because consumers have less money to spend because the government got the money its spending from us—the only place it can get money."

# The Stimulus follows the same plan that ruined Japan’s economy.
__________________________
"Japan, after a dramatic market crash and a drop in real estate prices responded with government spending not unlike what the US Congress is considering today. In fact, they had 10 stimulus bills between 1992 and 2000, spending billions on infrastructure construction, building bridges, roads, and airports as well as pouring money into biotech and telecommunications. While many countries enjoyed booming economies and falling unemployment during this time, Japan had a lost decade, seeing its unemployment more than double. They spent double the US level of GDP on infrastructure, and now have a lousy economy and have one of the highest national debts in the world.

After 10 stimulus packages, Japan has gone from having the second biggest economy in the world by a long shot, to being well behind the new number two, China, and is close to falling behind India. We do not want to follow their lead."

# The Stimulus is full of Wasteful Projects
__________________________
"While we were told the stimulus bill would focus on rebuilding America’s infrastructure—mainly the roads and bridges—only 5% of the current bill goes to such projects. The rest of the bill goes to pet projects like:"

$400,000,000.00 for researching sexually transmitted diseases

$200,000,000.00 to force the military to buy environmentally-friendly electric cars

$34,000,000.00 million to renovate the Department of Commerce headquarters

$75,000,000.00 million for a program to end smoking which, if successful will bankrupt the State Children's Health Program Democrats are about to pass (SCHIP) that is paid for by cigarette taxes

$650,000,000.00 million for digital TV coupons

$50,000,000.00 million for the National Endowment for the Arts

"These programs are just the 2008 version of the “midnight basketball” program that derailed Bill Clinton’s attempt to ram through a “stimulus” bill in 1992. Despite that bill failing, the economy quickly recovered and the economic boom of the 1990s began."

# The Government Can’t Afford the Stimulus
___________________________
"President Bush pushed the government deep into a $1.2 trillion deficit this year, the third time he has set a record for biggest deficit ever, and President Obama’s stimulus bill follows his lead, piling on more debt. The deficit in 2008 amounted to about 8 percent of GDP. The entire debt is about 35 percent of GDP.

Even for those who do still believe in Keynesianism, it is important to remember his theory didn’t start with the government already over a trillion dollars in the hole, he was generally operating from balanced budgets.

# We Can’t afford the Stimulus
___________________________
"How much is $825 billion? The Heritage Foundation has calculated that that comes to over $10,000 per American family. To further put that in context, on average, families annually spend:"

# $2,230 on apparel and services
# $3,595 on health care
# $4,322 on food at home
# $11,657 on shelter

# The Stimulus is Bigger Than the Economic Output of Most Countries
___________________________
"If this bill were a country, it’d be the 15th largest country in world, ranking between Australia and Mexico. It is bigger than the economies of Saudi Arabia and Iran combined. In fact, the $875 billion it calls for is more than all the cash in the United States."

# Central Planning like the Stimulus Doesn’t Work, Ask the USSR
___________________________
"If centrally planned government spending on a grand scale produced economic growth, the Soviet Union would have won the Cold War. If government spending on a grand scale produced economic growth we would be in the middle of the Bush Boom right now. It doesn’t. Working, saving, and investing leads to economic output and increases in productivity lead to growth.

As economics professor Steven Horwitz said, “The stimulus plans assume consumption is the source of growth. It is not. It is the consequence of said growth.”

# Remember the $750 Billion Bailout from this Fall?
___________________________
"It was just a couple months ago when we were told if we would just quickly hand over $750 billion to the Treasury Secretary to bailout his friends on Wall Street, he would make the economy all better. That didn’t work, and neither will an additional $825 billion."

# This Money Doesn’t Grow on Trees

"And this has nothing to do with paper money being made of cotton and linen. The only way the government gets money is through taxing, borrowing, or printing—that is, it has to take it out of the economy in order to put it back into the economy. If government borrows the money for the stimulus, then it will either have to print money later or raise taxes to pay it back. If it raises taxes to pay for the stimulus, it will, in effect, be robbing Peter to pay Paul – probably with interest. If it prints the money, inflation decreases the value of the dollar for every American – robbing Paul to pay Paul."

# Economists do NOT Agree this is a Good Idea
___________________________
"No matter how many times supporters of the bill say it, economists do not all agree this bill is a good idea. In fact, hundreds of economists have come out against it, including Noble Laureates, who signed a letter the Cato Institute ran as a full page ad in several major newspapers opposing the stimulus. Still more economists submitted statements to the US House of Representatives opposing the stimulus proposal."

And that's not all the reasons to reject this stimulus package out of hand. Only Barack Obama and "We The People" can urge this Democratic held Congress to make the appropriate changes necessary in order to make this very unhealthy stimulus package work.
The Pelosi's, Reid's, and Biden's are simply not getting it....and all the while that they blame conservative Republicans for obstructing, and whining, and playing their typical rhetorical blame game, when in fact it's the liberal Dems that are screwing up the works!

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At 01:57, February 3, 2009, lisalisabobisa said:
	Sorry to say this but the ATV trails will be a really positive thing for our clients and my job....:) Add Comment \| Link \| \|

At 07:39, February 3, 2009, Aielman said:

It isn't really a question of whether or not these programs will be good for some people. They will. There will be some jobs created and there will be quite a few wonderful things.

But that's not the point. This is being touted as a stimulus package and it's going to put us in debt to the tune of nearly a trillion dollars. This at a time we are still fighting in two countries and will be for at least 18 more months, and that's if we start the draw down immediately.

As nice as some of these programs will be for some people and for the unions, we can't afford them. We need to be spending our money on things that will actually stimulate the economy...not new deal boondoggles that have been proven, not only in the US but in other countries as well, to have the opposite effect of their announced intention.

If we're going to go another trillion in debt, it needs to be for programs that will actually stimulate the economy...not programs that fulfill a democrat wishlist and add hundreds of billions of new permanent government to our tax burden.

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At 08:47, February 3, 2009, Rubicon said:

"As nice as some of these programs will be for some people and for the unions, we can't afford them. We need to be spending our money on things that will actually stimulate the economy.."

This goes hand in hand with, "not right now". When someone like Bobisa says that ATV trails would help her and her company, I understand that and would want that to happen. But it's just not a good time. And when it's tied in with all this other useless crap then it's pretty much a given that it should be scrapped for now, along with the other stuff.

Since when did there come a difference between "earmarks" and "pork barrel?" As far as I know they both mean the same thing....I guess earmarks is a lighter way to say it, makes pork sound a little more friendly.....less impact. Your link to Politico.com doesn't in any way define "earmark" as being any different from "pork barrel".

"If we're going to go another trillion in debt, it needs to be for programs that will actually stimulate the economy...not programs that fulfill a democrat wishlist and add hundreds of billions of new permanent government to our tax burden."

Of course the Dems want more and bigger gub,ment, that's been their way forever. The more that the people have to rely on them and government the better....just look at the Welfare programs.
And once the "wishlist" is fulfilled, and the government grows bigger with the new programs, then it becomes harder to do away with them down the road regardless of how useless they are.

Supporting this bill as is, is indicative of the liberal mindset of more and bigger government.....that it's all good. Regardless of any negative impact it would have on the country.
I think it's odd that they don't realize that this will affect them too....you couldn't possibly believe that you're somehow immune; can you?

This week will be interesting in seeing how the senate will make the changes necessary to make this stimulus package more workable. If that's at all possible.

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At 10:11, February 3, 2009, Eclectablog said:
	I'm sorry, I thought when you repeatedly used the phrase "earmarks", you knew what they were. As far as big government, your party has been in charge of things for the past eight years and I've noticed that the government has grown MUCH bigger during that time. You think Republicans are going to reduce the size of the government? Hah! That's funny! Add Comment \| Link \| \|

At 05:01, February 3, 2009, LauriesAsylum said:
	We don't have much choice in what is going to happen, so hopefully the right decisions are going to be made. We can't afford to sink any lower. Add Comment \| Link \| \|

At 07:07, February 3, 2009, Patty said:
	Good evening Mike. Since you are so faithful at stopping by my blog and commenting, I am giving you a Friendship Award. Add Comment \| Link \| \|