Letter: Wasteful government spending leads to debt

6:45 PM, Apr. 9, 2013  |  Comments

The President's announcement of another spending program of $100 million for brain research does have merit. The problem, as I see it, is one of timing. It baffles me on how we can continue to spend millions of dollars while we are $16 trillion in debt. Congress, bless their little hearts, sits wringing its hands, seemingly clueless as to some of the ways they waste taxpayer money.

Here is a partial list I discovered, put together by smarter folks than me as to the ways the federal government wastes our money . The list was titled "Stupid things the government wastes money on."

? The government is spending $750,000 on a new soccer field for Guantanamo Bay.

? The Department of Health and Human Services plans to spend $500 million on a program that, among other things, will seek to solve the problem of 5-year-old children who that "can't sit still" in a kindergarten classroom.

? US farmers are given a total of $5 billion a year for not farming the land.

? According to the Washington Post, 1,271 different government organizations work on government programs related to counter-terrorism and homeland security.

? The federal government spends $25 billion a year maintaining federal buildings that are either unused or vacant.

? The US government once spent $2.6 million to train Chinese prostitutes to drink responsibly.

This list goes on and on, and it gets worst. So, here we are wondering how can we be in so much debt? Wonder no more folks, its total government mismanagement from top down.

Donald Sofia