Stimulus Money in North Carolina

Another politician gets the boot. Bob Etheridge was removed from Congress in November because they didn't think he could get the job done. He wasn't alone.

Maybe he's licking his wounds, this former Congressman/Superintendent of NC Public Schools/tobacco farmer/hardware store owner, but he is obviously recovering nicely. Thanks goes to NC's first woman governor, Beverly Perdue, for making him feel useful. She recently APPOINTED Ehteridge to a $98-thousand job, one that will allow him to oversee what's left of North Carolina's share of  infamous "stimulus" money. Yep, good old Bob, at 69, while drawing a lifetime salary as an "ex-congressman", gets to make sure the stimulas money is spent right. He has the experience for that job, right? Yeah. Right.

Perdue, you'll recall, promised that the state's unemployment rate would never get above eight percent during her reign. Stimulus money would create new jobs, and consumer confidence would be restored. It was going to be "all right". With the unemployment rate at 10-percent, the only new job I know anything about is the one she created for one of the good old boys. Seems more like a reign of terror.

Well, maybe it's not really as bad as I've made it sound. We know I'm a sarcastic so-and-so, and that I strongly urge voters to kick out EVERY person in the U.S. Congress and Senate, and replace our president and governor. But, I'll fess up...I could be wrong.

But. Why don't YOU take a look at how some of the state's share of that stimulus money has already been spent. Keep in mind, as you look this over, that the money was meant to stimulate consumer spending and create jobs.

In a "best of Obama Spending List", Brian Balfour of the John Pope Institute (they describe themselves as a conservative "research and public policy" organization in North Carolina), highlights a few of the benefits of the stimulus money:

1. Study of monkeys using cocaine: $71,623Wake Forest University was granted money to “study the effects of self-administering cocaine on the glutamate system on monkeys.”

2. North Carolina Dance Theatre: $50,000
This grant is used to retain four professional dancers from the North Carolina Dance Theatre’s second company.

3. Reducing hot flashes through yoga: $147,694
Funds granted to Wake Forest University to study “preliminary data on the efficacy of integral yoga for reducing menopausal hot flashes.”

4. Collecting, researching and reporting on the stimulus act:
Total: $492,940
Nearly half a million taxpayer dollars will go toward funding more propaganda selling the “benefits” of the stimulus plan.

5. Create interactive dance performance technology: $762,372
This grant to UNC-Charlotte will fund the development of computer technology to digitally record the dance moves of performers. The recorded movements can then be reviewed and manipulated by a computer program. Although creating virtual-reality type technology for dance movements may be interesting to those involved, how does this serve to “protect the education of our children”? At an average salary of roughly $47,000, this money could have saved 16 North Carolina teacher jobs.

6. American Dance Festival, Inc.: $50,000
A graphic designer and archivist will retain their jobs thanks to this grant. The American Dance Festival hosts dance classes, workshops and engages in other charitable activities to help support dancers.

7. Construction of a new Town Hall in Bladenboro:
Total: $300,000
Why are taxpayers from across the country forced to finance construction of a local government office? .

8. North Carolina Folk Life Institute:$25,000
With the help of this grant, the Institute was able to retain its executive director.

9. Preservation of an insect collection at North Carolina State: $253,123
We were promised that the stimulus was going to “save jobs.”

10. Greensboro Symphony Orchestra: $50,000
These funds are used to retain the GSO’s director of marketing and education manager.

Perhaps they should have combined 1 and 3, and studied cocaine's effect on hot flashes.

Am I the only person outraged by this kind of wasteful spending? It's just the tip of the iceberg, Folks, unless we, as taxpayers and voters, step up to the plate, and INSIST that those who represent us actually have our best interest at heart, then you can bet that we are headed for a Titanic ending.