[StBernard] Your tax dollars at work... on big government stimulus boondoggles

[Westley Annis]

Dear  Friend,


	

President Obama,  Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid told the American people that
if we did not pass  the $800 billion stimulus plan immediately unemployment
would continue to rise  above 10 percent.

	

The Department of  Labor recently announced that unemployment has now
exceeded 10 percent - a twofold increase since the start of  the recession.

	

Even  though Congressional liberals, over my strong opposition, passed their
stimulus, unemployment is still now above 10 percent.

	

Why? Because the stimulus was packed full  of wasteful pork barrel spending
that has nothing to do with stimulating our  economy. 

	

Here is where some of the money went: 

	

- $300,000 for a GPS-equipped helicopter  to hunt for radioactive rabbit
droppings at the Hanford nuclear reservation in  Washington state. 

	

- $30 million for a spring training baseball complex for the Arizona
Diamondbacks and Colorado Rockies. 

	

-  $2.3 million for the U.S. Forest Service to rear large numbers of
arthropods,  including the Asian longhorned beetle, the nun moth and the
woolly adelgid.

	

-  $3.4 million for a 13-foot tunnel for turtles and other wildlife
attempting to  cross U.S. 27 in Lake Jackson, Fla.

	

-  $9.38 million to renovate a century-old train depot in Lancaster County,
Pa.,  that has not been used for three decades.

	

These  projects are hardly the type of  stimulus we were promised and are
typical of  the waste and government growth we've seen this year.  That is
why I  offered an amendment to the stimulus to cut $40 billion in waste like
this and why joined a majority of our congressional delegation
<http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2009/roll046.xml>  in voting against the
stimulus
<http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cf
m?congress=111&session=1&vote=00061#position> .

	

At  a time when all Louisiana families are tightening their belts we need to
set an  example in Washington, not continue with runaway spending.  


Sincerely,
David Vitter
U.S.  Senator