Wasting Taxpayer Money

Rational people have known all along that the so-called Stimulus Bill was nothing but Democrat payback and pork. But this story on port barrel spending hits close to home.

But to former Republican presidential nominee John McCain, spending $454,200 in federal stimulus funds to replace lighting at Softball World, a city park in Euless, is a prime example of how the government is wasting taxpayer dollars.

"Playing in the glow of stimulus funded lights -- now that's something completely new," according to a "Summertime Blues" report written by Sens. McCain, R-Ariz., and Tom Coburn, R-Okla. "One would think that the teams using the fields should just pay higher fees for the light renovations instead of the American taxpayer, most of whom will never see Euless, Texas, no matter how bright the new lights are."

But many who live in the Northeast Tarrant County city said that more than 100,000 people use or visit the city park each year and that the lighting is a proper use of stimulus funds.

"This is ridiculous," said Richard Hopkins, who plays outfield with the Diamond Softball Club at the park about three nights a week. "A lot of people go to the park to play or watch, and this is a need.

"The lights are definitely antiquated, they are more than 25 years old. This will help make them energy-efficient," he said. "It's unfair that they singled out the one park in Euless."

Is this how we define a "need" these days? A bunch of people like playing softball, so they "need" taxpayer funds to upgrade the lighting system?

At a time of economic hardship, paying for new lighting at a softball field seems wasteful and trivial. And worse, look at the "jobs saved or created" numbers:

At No. 99 was Softball World, a project expected to be finished within a year and save or create 2.8 jobs.

That's something over $162k per job. For softball lights. And they wonder why Americans are angry?

For Those Who Didn't Vote for John McCain

As Michael Medved noted on his radio show today, I'd like to point out that had John McCain been elected president, the two Supreme Court picks Obama has made would have solidified the conservative Supreme Court.

Elections have consequences.

Game Change

Political reporters John Heilemann and Mark Halperin have a new book out about the 2008 campaign season. DRJ at Patterico's Pontifications lists some of the major bombshells in the book, then notes,

Imagine how many Washington campaign insiders and political reporters knew about these scandals but managed to keep them bottled up before the election. Except for the Sarah Palin stories, of course. The Palin reports were widely discussed by journalists, but stories that would damage the top Democratic candidates went largely unreported.

But there was no media bias covering Barack Obama. Naaah.

Hollow Principles Screw Us Over

That's the message of Dr. Melissa Clouthier regarding those who proudly handed us Barack Obama.

Look, plenty of people didn't like voting for John McCain. I supported McCain because I thought, of all the candidates available, he was most likely to be elected. I was never under the illusion that I would be happy with every decision McCain would make as POTUS. I wasn't happy with half the decisions he made as a candidate. But the presidency, as Joe Biden warned us, is no place for on-the-job training. Yet millions of people gave us just that.

Which leads back to the those smug bastards who voted for third party candidates knowing it would help Barack Obama and, somehow, absolve them of any blame for his incompetency. Everyone occasionally votes for a third party candidate with no chance to win as a protest against the major party contestants. But it seems to me that sticking it to us now so you can brag that it's "not your fault" and you "stuck to your principles" is short-sighted and childish.

Clouthier makes several good points that such ridiculous back-patting does nothing for the country but leave things in a bigger mess. Does it really make those people happier about skyrocketing deficits, union-backing, economic disaster, power-grabbing and socializing medicine? Evidently so, judging from their holier-than-thou writings.

Look, if it makes you feel better that you voted for a third party candidate while the government tells you which treatments you can have, then go for it. But the rest of us are ready to tell you to STFU.