[StBernard] Senator Tom Coburn

[Westley Annis]

A good read....although liberals and socialists will hate it.

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Sen. Tom Coburn is an MD (general practitioner) and  Senator from Okla.
and recognized as 'the conscience' of the US Senate. He is well respected on
both 'sides of the aisle' & probably one of the few senators to actually
read
these 'bail-out' bills. (Google him for his background.)




This takes a couple of minutes. It's from his speech in the Senate and it
should raise your blood pressure.

"We are going in exactly the wrong direction. We ought to be standing on the
principles that made this country great. There ought to be a review of every
program in the Federal Government that is not effective, that is not
efficient, that is wasteful or fraudulent, and we ought to get rid of it
right now. We ought to say, you're gone, to be able to pay for a real
stimulus plan that might, in fact, have some impact.




I would be remiss if I didn't remind everybody that next week we are going
to hear from the Obama administration wanting another $500 billion. Outside
of this, they are going to want another $500 billion to handle the banking
system.  Still not fixing the real disease-the pneumonia-we are going to
treat the fever or treat the cough, but we are not going to treat the real
disease.
Until we treat the real disease, this is pure waste. It is worse than pure
waste. It is morally reprehensible, because it steals the future of the next
two generations.
I am going to wind up here and finish, but I wanted to spend some time to
make sure the American people know what is in this bill. I think once they
know what is in this bill, they would reject it out of hand.

Let me read for my colleagues some of the things that are in this bill..
The biggest earmark in history is in this bill.  There is $2 billion in this
bill to build a coal plant with zero emissions. That would be great, maybe,
if we had the technology, but the greatest brains in the world sitting at
MIT say we don't have the technology yet to do that. Why would we build a $2
billion power plant we don't have the technology for that we know will come
back and ask for another $2 billion and another $2 billion and another $2
billion when we could build a demonstration project that might cost $150
million or $200 million?  There is nothing wrong with having coal-fired
plants that don't produce pollution; I am not against that. Even the
Washington Post said the technology isn't there. It is a boondoggle. Why
would we do that?
We eliminated tonight a $246 million payback for the large movie studios in
Hollywood  .
We are going to spend 88 Million to study  whether we ought to buy a new ice
breaker for the Coast Guard. You know what. The Coast Guard needs a new ice
breaker. Why do we need to spend $88 million? They have two ice breakers now
that they could retrofit and fix and come up with equivalent to what they
needed to and not spend the $1 billion they are going to come back and ask
for, for another ice breaker, so why would we spend $88 million doing that?
We are going to spend $448 million to build the Department of Homeland
Security a new building. We have $1.3 trillion worth of empty buildings
right now, and because it has been blocked in Congress we can't sell them,
we can't raze them, we can't do anything, but we are going to spend money on
a new building here in  Washington  .
We are going to spend another $248 million for new furniture for that
building; a quarter of a billion dollars for new furniture. What about the
furniture the Department of Homeland Security has now? These are tough
times. Should we be buying new furniture? How about using what we have? That
is what a family would do. They would use what they have. They wouldn't go
out and spend $248 million on furniture.




How about buying $600 million worth of hybrid vehicles? Do you know what I
would say? Right now times are tough; I would rather Americans have new cars
than Federal employees have new cars. What is wrong with the cars we have?
Dumping $600 million worth of used vehicles on the used vehicle market right
now is one of the worst things we could do. Instead, we are going to spend
$600 million buying new cars for Federal employees..
There is $400 million in here to prevent STDs .. I have a lot of experience
on that. I have delivered 4,000 babies. We don't need to spend $400 million
on STDs. What we need to do is properly educate about the infection rates
and the effectiveness of methods of prevention. That doesn't take a penny
more. You can write that on one piece of paper and teach every kid in this
country, but we don't need to spend $400 million on it.  It is not a
priority.




How about $1.4 billion for rural waste disposal programs? That might even be
somewhat stimulative.  New sewers.  That might create jobs.
How about $150 million for a Smithsonian museum? Tell me how that helps get
us out of a recession. Tell me how that is a priority. Would the average
American think that is a priority that we ought to be mortgaging our kids'
future to spend another $150 million at the Smithsonian?
How about $1 billion for the 2010 census? So everybody knows, the census is
so poorly managed that the census this year is going to cost twice-in 2010
is going to cost twice what it cost 10 years ago, and we wasted $800 million
on a contract because it was no-bid that didn't perform. Nobody got fired,
no competitive bidding, and we blew $800 million.
We have $75 million for smoking cessation activities, which probably is a
great idea, but we just passed a bill-the SCHIP bill-that we need to get 21
million more Americans smoking to be able to pay for that bill.  That
doesn't make sense.
How about $200 million for public computer centers at community colleges?
Since when is a community college in my State a recipient of Federal
largesse? Is that our responsibility? I mean, did we talk with Dell and
Hewlett-Packard and say, How do we make you all do better? Is there not a
market force that could make that better?
Will we actually buy on a true competitive bid?  No, because there is
nothing that requires competitive bidding in anything in this bill. There is
nothing that requires it. It is one of the things President Obama said he
wasgoing to mandate  the Federal Government, but there is no competitive
bidding in this bill at all.
We have $10 million to inspect canals in urban areas. Well, that will put 10
or 15 people to work. Is that a priority for us right now?
There is $6 billion to turn Federal buildings into green buildings. That is
a priority, versus somebody getting a job outside of  Washington  , a job
that actually produces something, that actually increases wealth?
How about $500 million for State and local fire stations? Where do you find
in the Constitution us paying for local fire stations within our realm of
prerogatives? None of it is competitively bid - not a grant program.
Next is $1.2 billion for youth activities. Who does that employ?  What does
that mean?
How about $88 million for renovating the public health service building? You
know, if we could sell half of the $1.3 trillion worth of properties we
have, we could take care of every Federal building requirement and backlog
we have.
Then there's $412 million for CDC buildings and property. We spent billions
on a new center and headquarters for CDC. Is that a priority? Building
another Government building instead of - if we are going to spend $412
million on building buildings, let's build one that will produce something,
one that will give us something.
How about $850 million for that most "efficient'' Amtrak that hasn't made
any money since 1976 and continues to have $2 billion or $3 billion a year
in subsidies?
Here is one of my favorites: $75 million to construct a new "security
training'' facility for State Department security officers, and we have four
other facilities already available to train them. But it is not theirs. They
want theirs. By the way, it is going to be in West Virginia ... I wonder how
that got there? So we are going to build a new training facility that
duplicates four others that we already have that could easily do what we
need to do. But because we have a stimulus package, we are going to add in
oink pork.
How about $200 million in funding for a lease-not buying, but a lease of
alternative energy vehicles on military installations?
We are going to bail out the States on Medicaid. Total all of the health
programs in this, and we are going to transfer $150 billion out of the
private sector and we are going to move it to the Federal Government. You
talk about back dooring national health care. Henry Waxman has to be smiling
big today. He wants a single-payer Government-run health care system. We are
going to move another $150 billion to the Federal Government from the
private sector.
We are going to eliminate fees on loans from the Small Business
Administration. You know what that does? That pushes productive capital to
unproductive projects. It is exactly the wrong thing to do.
Then there is $160 million to the Job Corps Program-but not for 20 jobs and
not to put more people in the Job Corps but to construct or repair
buildings.
We are going to spend $524 million for information technology upgrades that
the Appropriations Committee claims will create 388 jobs. If you do the math
on that, that is $1.5 million a job. Don't you love the efficiency of
Washington thinking?
We are going to create $79 billion in additional money for the States, a
"slush fund,'' to bail out States and provide millions of dollars for
education costs. How many of you think that will ever go away? Once the
State education programs get $79 billion over 2 years, do you think that
will ever go away?  The cry and hue of taking our money away - even though
it was a stimulus and supposed to be limited, it will never go away. So we
will continue putting that forward until our kids have grand kids of their
own.
There is about $47 billion for a variety of energy programs that are
primarily focused on renewable energy. I am fine with spending that. But we
ought to get something for it.  There ought to be metrics. There are no
metrics. It is pie in the sky, saying we will throw some money at it.

Let me conclude by saying we are at a seminal moment in our country. We will
either start living within the confines of realism and responsibility or we
will blow it and we will create the downfall of the greatest Nation that
ever lived. This bill is the start of that downfall. To abandon a
market-oriented society and transfer it to a Soviet-style,
government-centered, bureaucratic-run and mandated program, that is the
thing that will put the stake in the heart of freedom in this country.

I hope the American people know what is in this bill. I am doing everything
I can to make sure they know. But more important, I hope somebody is
listening who will treat the pneumonia we are faced with today, which is the
housing and mortgage markets.  It doesn't matter how much money we spend in
this bill. It is doomed to failure unless we fix that problem first. Failing
that, we will go down in history as the Congress that undermined the future
and vitality of this country. Let it not be so."