I love ham and pork chops, but I’m really not willing to spend more than $2.49 a pound for it, and certainly won’t buy it for anyone I don’t know. Well, maybe except for Henrietta Hughes, who was authentically pathetic, poor thing. But she can breathe easy. I see Oprah in her future. And a book deal or two.
If you want to know what’s in this “stimulus” package (about the only thing stimulating is Rush’s comments), follow this link. If you’re too lazy to read it, here it is in a nutshell (all direct quotes from the article with parenthetical asides by me):
- $3 billion for “prevention and wellness programs, including $335 million for “education and prevention” of sexually transmitted diseases.
- An additional $50 million to the National Endowment for the Arts.
- A tax break worth up to $246 million over 11 years for outside investors in big-budget Hollywood movie projects. (OOOOH those poor starving starlets! Maybe Brangelina is running out of money for all those babies.)
- $10 million for bike and walking trails, $200 million for plug-in electric car stations, $400 million for climate change research by NASA scientists, $600 million to buy new “green” cars for government workers, $800 million for more cleanup of “Superfund” pollution sites, and $1.5 billion for the construction of new “green” school buildings. (And if I have to hear one more person talk about “going green,” I’ll have to hurt someone!)
- $2.25 billion provision in the House bill for the National Parks – almost equal to the National Park Service’s total yearly budget, and a eyebrow-raising increase of almost three times the $802 million the Senate Appropriations Committee put in its “stimulus” bill.
My boss is happy (I work for the DOT). He thinks we’re going to get money for fixing our roads, and we really are in a mess here in New York. Not even the middle of February, and there are no funds left for road salt. No road salt? In Upstate New York? That’s bad. Shhh. I wasn’t supposed to say anything about that! But since there’s a good chance only about 10 percent of that will get spent in 2009, and all of it won’t be spent until BHO is out of office (one can only HOPE), I don’t think we’re going to see more road salt money anytime soon.
Of course, I do have them take extra money out of my paycheck to pay my New York State income tax. I suppose they can use that.
