that politicians and lobbyists say one thing, and then do another?!

< style="Little Kid from 'Eight Men Out'" >

Say it ain't so, Joe, say it ain't so!

< /style >

Also, maybe it's just me (and I might be called upon to turn in my left-leaning credentials by saying this), but calling out the ACU for the fact that 5 out of *35* of its board members are lobbyists seems a bit much. They're on the board, not the executive director (the guy who runs the daily operations, who also sent out the email). Is it suspect? Yes. Are they the majority of the people who direct the policy choices of the entire ACU? No. So, until there are more than 14% of the board who are lobbyists, I don't really see this as an issue.

Each party and each political wing has people who do not agree with all of the ideals that are ascribed to that party/wing (see pro-life Democrats/liberals (Bob Casey Jr), or pro-choice Republicans/conservatives (Lincoln Chafee)). Are we reduced to calling out hypocrisy towards an *advocacy* group for the actions of its minority, when the elected *Administration* performs with so much more disregard to their supposed ideals?

I think it was Ben Franklin that said, the more they proclaimed their innocence, the faster we hid our silverware. These guys are all liars and crooks, the republicans exponentially more so than the democrats, and we'll be lucky to recover from this wholesale theft of the treasury in our lifetimes. I am sure some in congress are innocent of theft, perhaps even noble in their aspirations, but the fact is if they don't stand up every day and try to stop this robbery, the outcome is the same and their personal integrity makes not a whit of difference.

Funny, that. I have in front of me the latest report from the Tax Foundation showing how much each state gets back in contracts, benefits and subsidies for every dollar of taxes paid. And it shows that, with a few exceptions, the anti-government red states are the net winners in the flow of funds while the pro-government blue states are almost all losers.

What's the causal relationship? Do red staters get more money from the feds because they elect Republicans, or is there some other causal relationship? I'd be interested in seeing how the dollars in/dollars out map looked back when Democrats controlled the legislature. I'm willing to bet that some other variable -- possibly union density since union workers makes so much more money than non-union -- raises both dollars out and proclivity to vote blue.

Abstract: Thirty of the U.S. states reap more in federal spending than their citizens

contribute to the federal government in taxes. The other 20 states provide more in taxes than they receive in spending. In the 2000 U.S. presidential election, George W. Bush won most of the states that are net beneficiaries of federal spending programs, while Al Gore won most of the states that are net contributors to federal spending. A state’s ratio of federal spending to tax dollars, particularly non-defense spending, is a statistically and substantively significant predictor of Bush’s margin of victory across the states. A state’s per capita federal tax burden is also associated with the election result: states with higher tax burdens gave higher vote margins to Gore. Compared to Clinton’s state-by-state vote shares in 1996, Gore did worse in states that gained in federal spending per tax dollar from 1998 to 2000.

Red States Make a Mockery Of Self-Reliance

By Steven Pearlstein

Wednesday, January 19, 2005; Page E01

(snip)

Funny, that. I have in front of me the latest report from the Tax Foundation showing how much each state gets back in contracts, benefits and subsidies for every dollar of taxes paid. And it shows that, with a few exceptions, the anti-government red states are the net winners in the flow of funds while the pro-government blue states are almost all losers.