We are in the midst of the 148th anniversary of Sherman's march to the sea.

[MrFun]

It's a reason not to treat such spending as a good thing in and of itself.

I agree with you that the examples you posted about, are wasteful.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

But according to Sava, with whom you agreed, wasteful is still good. Essentially there is no reason to differentiate wasteful vs. non-wasteful.

[MrFun]

I disagree with Sava on that particular point.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

So your response to post 277 is actually a typo and should be:

[MrFun]

I was agreeing with Sava's point about wasteful concentration of wealth.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

A point I wasn't even making but Sava ranted about regardless.

[MrFun]

This is Apolyton OT. I am free to agree with anything irrelevant to another person's point.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Some highlights from the last round of "stimulus:
A rail extension is to be built to get to professional sports stadiums and a casino (Pittsburgh, PA) for $62 million
A town replaces for $89,298 new sidewalks with newer sidewalks that lead to a ditch (Boynton, OK)
Bus Station Art (Los Angeles, CA) - $1 million - Source

If it wasn't all classified, I could give you a less cherry-picked list of spending abuse out of DHS and DoD during the limited time I could stand working for USG that makes that look like nothing.

What you have is an argument for a non-partisan, non-politically influenced infrastructure bank with cross-sectional representation between industry and construction professionals (civil engineers, telecomms engineers, construction management consultants, etc.) municipal and regional planners, and members of the public, to vette and prioritize projects which are competing for public infrastructure funding, and score them on objective criteria, prior to award, along with an OIG and audit function.

What you don't have is an argument against infrastructure funding. Or properly applied stimulus. BTW, since I commute fairly regularly across southern California, I see road projects that are stimulus funded on a regular basis - lane expansions, creation of new exits, resurfacing of freeways that are chewed to hell and back from 40 years of overuse, etc., all benefitting several million people, and interestingly enough, a very large portion of them in two very red counties, Orange County and Riverside County. I don't hear a lot of OC Republicans (at least those who have to drive themselves to work) *****ing about that stimulus money.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Some highlights from the last round of "stimulus:
A rail extension is to be built to get to professional sports stadiums and a casino (Pittsburgh, PA) for $62 million
A town replaces for $89,298 new sidewalks with newer sidewalks that lead to a ditch (Boynton, OK)
Bus Station Art (Los Angeles, CA) - $1 million - Source

If it wasn't all classified, I could give you a less cherry-picked list of spending abuse out of DHS and DoD during the limited time I could stand working for USG that makes that look like nothing.

What you have is an argument for a non-partisan, non-politically influenced infrastructure bank with cross-sectional representation between industry and construction professionals (civil engineers, telecomms engineers, construction management consultants, etc.) municipal and regional planners, and members of the public, to vette and prioritize projects which are competing for public infrastructure funding, and score them on objective criteria, prior to award, along with an OIG and audit function.

What you don't have is an argument against infrastructure funding. Or properly applied stimulus. BTW, since I commute fairly regularly across southern California, I see road projects that are stimulus funded on a regular basis - lane expansions, creation of new exits, resurfacing of freeways that are chewed to hell and back from 40 years of overuse, etc., all benefitting several million people, and interestingly enough, a very large portion of them in two very red counties, Orange County and Riverside County. I don't hear a lot of OC Republicans (at least those who have to drive themselves to work) *****ing about that stimulus money.

[regexcellent]

Well yes, the military is the biggest federal pork program anywhere. But the stimulus wasn't so much a stimulus as a permanent 800 billion dollar spending increase on stupid worthless ****.

[DaShi]

reg's list of stupid worthless ****:

1. Individual Tax Credits for homebuyers
2. Tax Credits for Workers
3. Tax Incentives for Businesses
4. Tax credits for alternative energy
5. Tax-exempt bonds to expand industrial development
6. Education
7. Highway infrastructure
8. Water and Waste disposal
9. Fossil fuel R&D
10. Homelessness prevention programs
11. Health
12. FEMA
13. Job Training

[Imran Siddiqui]

I agree with you that the examples you posted about, are wasteful.

I don't see why extending rail lines to sports stadiums & casino is wasteful, personally. Sounds like a good use of funds - easier for folk to be able to make it to revenue generating entertainment services.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Maybe not wasteful, but more likely lobbying driven than the most efficient utilization of $62MM of infrastructure funding - unless, as is typical, these little right-wing summaries ignore things like offsetting transit revenue, public-private funding partnerships (as is common with this type of project), and intermediate stops/stations. You really have to look at the full details of a project, except the occasional bridge to nowhere, which is the rare exception, not the rule.

The flip side of what reg whines about is the Orange County Transportation Authority's stimulus projects, which benefit millions of uses and the federal funds supplement locally raised, voter approved funds. One of the efficiencies gained by OCTA is they have oversight of all transportation systems - freeways, express lanes within freeways, interface and coordination with private toll roads, rail and bus, so you have a lot more cohesive and integrated planning.

[Felch]

The flip side of what Felch whines about is the Orange County Transportation Authority's stimulus projects, which benefit millions of uses and the federal funds supplement locally raised, voter approved funds. One of the efficiencies gained by OCTA is they have oversight of all transportation systems - freeways, express lanes within freeways, interface and coordination with private toll roads, rail and bus, so you have a lot more cohesive and integrated planning.

You do realize that this is my first post in this thread, right? Where have I whined about OCTA stimulus projects?

[Felch]

Wait, nevermind. You're a lying piece of ****, who makes baseless claims, and then insults people instead of providing evidence to support them.