You Decide

This week we learned that the Imperial Federal Government has squandered around $20 million dollars on signs. That $20 million? Well, that was stimulus money. The signs? They simply said, “Hey, y’all! We’re spending stimulus money here! Ain’t that cool?”

OK, so the wording may not be exact. The signs actually say something about “The American Reinvestment and Recovery Act” and contain that wonderful phrase “Putting America Back to Work.” Yeah, putting America back to work painting signs that say we’re putting America back to work. That probably works for the average Democrat voter. But not for me.

The National Tax Foundation has released a report setting the average annual tax burden per household to be about $17,000. That’s no small amount of change, and considering that about one-half of households pay nothing, you can imagine how high the burden is for some. Let’s pick on one particular sign — one erected by the Washington Airports Authority. ABC News reports that this authority spent $10,000 on one sign near Dulles International Airport telling anyone who cared to read it that a runway improvement project was being funded by stimulus funds.

Why the signs? The ABC investigation shows a political motivation: The Obama administration issued “General Guidelines for Emblem and Logo Applications” for signs touting stimulus projects. According to the leaked document the signs and logos — similar to the Obama 2008 campaign logo — were designed to be “a symbol of President Obama’s commitment to the American people to invest their tax dollars wisely and put Americans back to work.” Yeah, right. That’s $20 million for Obama PR.

The sign at Dulles costs $10,000. So let’s find a family who’s federal tax burden mirrors the average: $17,000. We’ll look for a family that might be having a problem paying some bills. They’re having trouble making their mortgage payments, and foreclosure is being threatened. There have been some recent health problems that wiped out their savings. Their eldest daughter is in college, and that’s costing about $25,000 a year. The roof needs repairing, the car doesn’t run all that well, and the septic tank needs cleaning. This is a family that could use an extra 10 grand right about now, maybe 10 grand cut from their federal tax bill.

So, here’s what I would like the Great and Powerful Community Organizer to do. We’ll make a media event out of it — you know how much the Chosen One loves grand media events. We’ll take the family and televise a meeting between them and Obama. First the financially beleaguered couple can tell Obama of all the things they could do right now with an extra $10,000. They can detail the home repairs that are waiting, how much it would take to catch their mortgage up to date, and how their daughter is planning to pack up and head home from college if they can’t rustle up the rest of her tuition. Then, after our compassionate and caring ruler absorbs all of this information, I want to hear him tell this family that they can’t have that $10,000 they worked for and earned. They can’t have that money because it was oh so desperately needed to put a sign up near Washington’s airport so everyone would know how much their president cares about spending their tax dollars wisely.

Using the police power of government to seize money from the person who earned it so that you can spend the money to erect a sign telling the person who earned the money that you’re spending the money wisely to put them back to work. That perverse logic can only work for a politician. The politician who cannot defend their spending face-to-face with the person who’s money they have seized needs to find another way to earn a living. We can arrange that."

Listen to Neal Boortz live from 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. weekdays on AM750 WSB Radio.

http://www.ajc.com/opinion/neal-boortz-enjoy-paying-572320.html