Ladies & Gentlemen, Your U.S. Government Hard At Work

The Citizens Against Government Waste has released their 2008 Congressional Pig Book Summary. While we're down here struggling to get by, what with April 15 breathing down our necks, they're up there wasting our money on stupid crap like:

$1.9 million for the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at The City College of New York. The project was slipped into the Labor/Health and Human Services spending bill by none other than Rep. Charles B. Rangel, the Democratic chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee

$3 million for "The First Tee," a program designed to teach the game of golf to young people. This was slipped into the Defense Appropriations Bill by House Majority Whip James Clyburn of South Carolina. Though The First Tee has extensive corporate sponsors and individual donators, Clyburn said the program "will help make generals and colonels"
Can golf really make generals and colonels?

$188,000 for the Lobster Institute in Maine. This was added by Maine's Republican Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, along with Rep. Thomas Allen. It is said to be a cooperative program of "research and education with the lobster industry." Among other programs, the institute has been working on an underwater "lobster cam" and touts one of its achievements as the creation of lobster biscuits for dogs
I know my dog's mouth is watering for lobster biscuits

More than $740,000 went to olive fruit fly research, of which $211,000 will pay for research that takes place in Paris, France. This program was added to the agriculture spending bill by Democratic Rep. Mike Thompson of California

Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia is a legendary pork barreller, and in his list of earmarks this year is $123,050 for a Mother's Day shrine in Grafton, W.V., which has a population of 5,489

Virginia Republican Rep. Virgil Goode added $98,000 to the budget to develop a walking tour of Boydton, Va., which boasts a population of 474 and covers less than one square mile
I'm sure Boydton, Va. has many, many historical sites and needs this money for their tours to them

$390,000 for jazz music at Lincoln Center earmarked by NY Senators Clinton, Schumer & Nadler

$1.6 million for the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago earmarked by Ill. Senators Obama, Durbin, House appropriator Mark Kirk and Rep. Davis. The aquarium receives 2 million visitors a year and has 36 corporate backers

And one of the things I like about Sen. McCain, he didn't request any earmarks and he's against them.

You can download the 59 page PDF here.
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