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January 22, 2010
We're From the Government, We're Here to Embezzle
Posted by The MaryHunter at January 22, 2010 7:31 AM
This is just what you'd expect from an out-of-control government bureaucracy that's been growing since the Bush Administration and funds laughable education studies to the tune of billions of dollars: federal workers are padding their travel expenses for their own travel-related amusement.
At the State Department, for instance, nearly 80 percent of the more than $300,000 in airfare reviewed at one little-known office in fiscal 2007 and 2008 went to pay for business-class airline tickets, and many of those purchases violated federal travel policy.
One senior manager at the National Science Foundation took or extended taxpayer-funded trips totaling more than $10,000 to facilitate liaisons with women in Paris, Tokyo and Vancouver.
When asked by investigators whether it was appropriate to consider a woman's presence in Vancouver when deciding whether to speak at workshop there, documents show the [NSF] official responded, "Yeah, why not?"
Embezzling is embezzling, period -- whether it's to take in an extra 18 holes, or just a few holes in select destinations.
Of course, there's nothing new here - local and federal government employees in the early 1900s partook in personal-travel junkets at taxpayer expense. These recent excesses, obtained by The Washington Times through a Freedom of Information Act request, stretch back through 2007 and reveal just how corrupt and out of touch Washington has become, even in the face of record deficits and unimaginable national debt. In fact, I was just talking with my 7 y.o. about all those zeros in large numbers and asked her what they really mean. She said immediately: "Ten times. Each one is ten times."
My daughter gets it. Clearly, however, our rogue, bloated government bureaucracy still doesn't.
