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Posted on 02/03/2005 3:22:00 AM PST by billorites
DON YOUNG has a bridge he wants to sell you. It’s not the Brooklyn Bridge, but it’s taller. It’s not the Golden Gate Bridge, but it’s almost as long. It’ll take you to the airport, if you happen to be flying out of Ketchikan, Alaska.
Not buying? Maybe you are: Don Young is a member of Congress.
Ketchikan, Alaska, is a little tourist town — a very little tourist town. Only 14,000 people live there, and it has just one main road. But years ago, Alaska persuaded Congress to build an airport on a nearby island. The airport has only six or eight flights a day, and people get there by taking a boat ride. The ride takes just seven minutes, and people love it. One told ABC News, “When people come to Ketchikan, that little ferry ride is what they remember.”
Another, who called the ferry system “just dandy,” pointed out a feature that might endear it to all of us: “It doesn’t cost $200 million.”
Maybe I should say that’s a feature that might endear it to all of us who don’t represent Alaska in Congress, as Don Young, a Republican, does. Two hundred million dollars is the price tag on the bridge he wants to build to rescue people from that dandy ferry. Now, some of us are worried about our taxes being too high. Some of us are worried that the government may not be able to fund Medicare. Some of us are worried about soft-headed politicians wasting our hard-earned money. In fact, some of us might even agree with the congressman who said to his colleagues, “If any of you think 1 percent can’t be cut out of any part of our budget, you haven’t been here that long, and most of you have been here that long.”
That congressman was — you guessed it — Don Young. But he said that back when the Democrats were in charge. Today, Young is chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, and in control of the big transportation bills. Now, he no longer sees pork-barrel spending as just a horrible waste of money. For Don Young, pork can be a wonderful waste of money.
“Don Young said he stuffed this bill like a turkey and he’s proud of that,” says Keith Ashdown of Taxpayers for Common Sense. Ashdown’s organization awarded Young’s bridge the Golden Fleece Award, a prize reserved for what TCS calls “wasteful, ironic or ridiculous” ways to use — or misuse — the money the government forces us to give it in taxes. “Don Young has turned into a tax-and-spend Republican,” says Ashdown. “He wants you and me to pay for his bridges to nowhere.”
Nowhere? Well, there is that airport, but beyond that, the island has no roads and is home mostly to trees.
Rep. Young says the bridge is worth the price because it would create jobs in Alaska. But that’s just politicians’ folly because the $200 million would create more jobs if it were left with the people who made the money in the first place, instead of being taken from them by the government. And in any case, an economist who studied the matter for the state says that once the construction workers finished their work and went home, the bridge would probably create about 40 new jobs. Two hundred million dollars for 40 jobs is $5 million per job. I hope they’re great jobs.
Young wouldn’t talk to me about this. Maybe he’s too busy bringing home even more money for Alaskans. His state is one of the least populated in America, but he has helped get it more pork dollars than any other state but one. Some of that pork, like the Ketchikan bridge, isn’t even popular with the locals. Most of the people ABC News talked to in that little tourist town with the scenic ferry said they didn’t want a bridge. They gave it descriptions like “a colossal waste of taxpayers’ money,” “a boondoggle” and “a rotten idea.”
Don Young must think it’s a good idea, though. It’s so good he wants to improve on it. He’s found another nearly empty piece of Alaska where there’s room for a bridge, and he wants to spend your money to build one there, too. What’s the improvement? This next bridge may cost a billion dollars.
Give me a break.
Damn big spending democrats. Whats that.....?
I never thought I would live to see the day when the Republicans managed to make the Democrats look like the party of fiscal responsibility.
Our government, from local town committees to Washington, has turned into a Pay to Play campground and statesmen are in short supply.
I was thinking this was about the Rapist and Former President's new Porno Museum in Little Rock.
If we lower taxes, maybe they'll have less "play money" to spend.
The "get our shared of the Federal Pie" scramble that our Congress has become (well, and always has been) is disgusting. We have to shrink the pie AND make it taste bad. Don't know how to do the latter.
That transition has been both short and swift. I'm known to hold the opinion that there isn't a bit of difference in the two party cartel, and have been flamed again and again. Yet, hardly a day goes by that I'm not justified in having that opinion. Blackbird.
that can mean alot more than the reporter is stating, but I have to have another cup before I respond further...ping
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Democrats belong to the party that says that government is the solution to all life's problems and promise to give you everything.Republicans on the other hand, are in the party that claims that government is fatally flawed and corrupt. When they're elected into power they prove it through their actions.
"has anybody seen the bridge.....where's that confounded bridge."
back a decade ago they widened the worlds biggest parking lot. The Long Island Expressway. at one intersection they replaced a perfectly functioning clover leaf intersecting the L.I.E. with Sagtikos parkway. by replacing this clover leaf ( inexpensively made my carving it out of the ground), with 2 new overpasses to solve a problem that didnt exist. Now the old clover leaf could have been updated to handle the traffic as there was plenty of land to accomplish this. but this would not have lined any pockets. so.....now we have these 2 lovely edifices that the Bond Issue, I voted against, paid for....with MY money.
God bless NY State.
ps. the widening of the LIE took place and is basically useless, becasue hardley anyone rides in the manditory HOV lane that was the final outcome of this white elephant.
God Bless you Mr. Cuomo, God Bless you Mr. Pataki.
bump
You neglect to say it took a decade to do. Ditto the work on the Queensborough Bridge.
Robert Byrd did it for years. West Virginia was renamed Byrdland about 30 years ago.
However, that is still no excuse.
Sadly there seem to be just as many, if not more wasteful projects pushed by Republicans as by Democrats. When it comes to looting the treasury there doesn't seem to be a lot of difference between the two parties.
"The Democrats are the party of government activism, the party that says government can make you richer, smarter, taller, and get the chickweed out of your lawn. Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work, and then get elected and prove it." — P.J. O'Rourke
But George Bush is "irresponsible" for cutting taxes and producing a budget deficit.
I mostly agree, except the Dems spend the cash on social workers and hippies, the Republicans spend on engineers. If you put both parties in a barrel, and pulled them out at random on a dark night, the only way you could tell a dimes worth of difference is the Democrats smell like dope smoke......
Looting the treasury is a sport thoroughly enjoyed by both political parties.
Construction Projects "Create Jobs" has to be the all time #1 Urban Legend
They don't - period. ALL construction projects are built by contractors who..... are you ready..... ALREADY HAVE the required personnel on the payroll! Otherwise they wouldn't be qualified to BID on the project as they wouldn't be able to furnish a Performance & Payment Bond. And even if an 'under staffed' contractor was the low bidder, before the contract was actually awarded, they would be further checked out to see if they were capable of DOING the project.
This isn't the 1930's and we AIN'T building the Hoover Dam and we DON'T hang a 'Help Wanted' sign on the front gate any longer. Then there's the little matter of the trade unions but that's another story.
Bottom line, Construction Projects only create work for EXISTING contractors with an EXISTING work force and who are looking for a 'back log' (future work) for projects to commence when their existing projects are completed and/or are in the final stages of completion.
Granted some 'workers' go from contractor to contractor as jobs end and or start - but those are EXISTING workers. No new jobs "are created". (btw, with that type of personnel, the term 'worker' is being generous)
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