Your Tax Dollars Hardly Working

(Editor's Note: Since I am hard at work on what I hope will be the masterpiece of a lifetime, I am neglecting the blog. Instead of being a daily commentary, it's going to be more of a weekly event. Joey will continue to do his Saturday blog -- just to keep you posted on his congressional campaign, if nothing else. And we're hoping that Mom, who started this thing, will eventually get freed up enough to contrribute on a weekly basis too.)

On to the blog.

CNN is running a series about how the billions of stimulus dollars are being spent. It's been a bit of an eye-opener. This morning, for instance, it tracked down three projects being funded by our future tax dollars:

-- About $18 million went to set up and maintain the website that tracks the stimulus money. (I wonder how much the CEO of that company is making? And who does s/he know to get that gig?)
-- Nearly $200,000 went to renovate four bathrooms at a federal facility in Wisconsin. (I know plumbers aren't cheap, but this seems a bit ridiculous.)
-- More than $9,000 went to buy 20 mesh chairs for a federal office. (Hello? Did anyone in government ever hear of Office Depot?)

These projects, which are just the tip of the iceberg, raise some questions. Were they bid out in keeping with federal purchasing rules? Or is the stimulus money going to Friends (read "supporters") of Congress? Were the chairs made in the U.S.? Is that even a requirement for stimulus money since we're borrowing a lot of it from China? Exactly how many jobs were created, or even "saved," by these projects?

And, finally, were these projects necessary? Ah, that's the biggie. I don't know about you, but when things are financially tight at my house, the last thing we do is spend extravagantly on remodeling or go out and buy expensive furniture. No, we stick to the bread-and-butter things -- like groceries, gas for the car and utilities.

But then we have to get by on what we earn -- not on what we can take out of someone else's pocket.