Federal Dollars thrown away in haste...again

When decisions are made quickly, the decisions are costly.

After September 11, the Federal Government was quick to pay off the families of those who died as a result of a the terrorist attack that entered us into a prolonged war on terror. The cost of the Victims fund ran $7 billion for a total of $2.08 million for each of the victims.

Just for the record, the family of a downed serviceman in combat is $500,000.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina is estimated to cost $200 billion dollars to rebuild the lives and cities affected by the massive storm.

An interesting piece of information, $848 million dollars was spent on trailer houses that are left rotting in an Arkansas muddy bog. Of the 25,000 mobile homes purchased, 1200 of the homes were used.

We should not act in haste when it comes to spending money in a crisis.

But if you read the newspaper today, you will find another example of wasteful spending made in haste by our politicians used to spending billions of dollars with a voice vote and a stroke of the pen.

In the aftermath of the hanging chads in Florida, a fever swept through Washington and along with the fever, $3 billion was spent on computer voting machines. After two election cycles of headaches and hassles, nearly all of the voting machines have been "mothballed" because they were prone to errors--and the fact people didn't know how to use them.

Let this be a lesson when it comes to spending money over the 14 impending crisis affecting our nation in the next four years.

We need someone who knows how to say "no", not someone who knows how to bring more money back to their home state in order to get their "fair share."