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   Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Gnter Grass still thinks reunification was a bad idea.
 Forty years of writing from Taylor Branch, James Fallows, Katherine Boo, Marjorie Williams, Joshua Micah Marshall, and more.
 With help from Washington, the for-profit college industry is loading up millions of low-income students with debt they'll never pay off.
 The best recent memoir from republican Washington is a hoax. That should tell you something.
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March 10, 2009
THEY'RE SPENDING HOW MUCH?.... Let me get this straight: $650,000 for beaver management is outrageous, even if it helps prevent extensive property damage. $200,000 for a gang-tattoo-removal program is ridiculous, even if it helps prevent crime. $951,500 for the Oregon Solar Highway is absurd, even if it's a pilot program for a no-emissions alternative energy initiative. But $1 million for a birthday party committee, honoring a president who died years ago, is the kind of spending that enjoys broad, bipartisan support.
The Reagan Centennial Commission couldn't have raised $1 million privately for this? Rumor has it, the former president had some admirers in the corporate world. They may have been willing to chip in a few bucks. Mike Lillis added, "[The $1 million is] nothing, of course, relative to the trillion dollar figures we're hearing out of Washington these days. Still, in the middle of a deepening recession, when deficit spending is flirting with $2 trillion in 2009 alone, is this really the best way to be spending taxpayer dollars?" Truth be told, I don't much care about the money for a Reagan birthday party. The misplaced hero worship strikes me as kind of silly, but predictable. I'm struck, though, by the context. Republican lawmakers can't scream "Pork!" loud enough, even on spending measures that make sense and save us money. But $1 million for a committee to plan a birthday party for someone who isn't even alive anymore strikes these same people as a great idea. If I didn't know better, I might think Republicans love their version of Reagan more than they hate dubious spending measures. Update: CNN and Glenn Thrush are now reporting that the initial reporting on this was mistaken, and that the Centennial Commission will not spend federal funds. I'm not sure how the reports could have gotten this story backwards, but it appears there's nothing to see here. Move along....
Comments
Reagan's real achievement was to serve as misdirection. Our Republican friends are at least smart enough to figure out that he can fulfill that role in death as well as in life. Posted by: Roddy McCorley on March 10, 2009 at 12:33 PM | PERMALINKThis morning CNBC's Cramer (responding to Jon Stewart) said that he recommends to sell everything. He thinks Jon won't every play a clip of him recommending everyone sell. On queue, all of Dow's 30 industrials are up today. Any bets if Jon Stewart will take him up on that bet tonight? Posted by: tomj on March 10, 2009 at 12:39 PM | PERMALINK"heh, indeed," said the mechanical monkey... Posted by: neill on March 10, 2009 at 12:43 PM | PERMALINKAmerica's Opposition Party: McCainBeavis: "heh heh Obama said 'Beaver management' heh heh" JindalButthead: "uh huh. He said "Volcano Monitoring". heh heh" McCainBeavis: "Reagan party tonight. You going?" Posted by: Ohioan on March 10, 2009 at 12:47 PM | PERMALINKGovernment is the problem, not the solution...to commemorative birthday events. Raise your own goddamn money if you think a 100th birthday party for a dead president is a wonderful idea. How many jobs is this going to create, other than for the janitors the next morning who have to pick up the cigar butts and empty bottles of cheap champagne? Posted by: jonas on March 10, 2009 at 12:48 PM | PERMALINKNice of the Republicans to hand the Democrats a club to beat them over the head with when they object to truly useful expenditures that cost even less than their precious Reagan committee. They probably only wanted to give some wingnut welfare jobs to their comrades who are having a little trouble finding work these days, but the effect will be the same. Steve, I've noticed that tompaine.com has linked to a few of your posts reccently. That's great, I love that website and am glad you're getting some props. As for Reagan's birthday celebration funded by none other than the US taxpayer, I'm simply counting the minutes until I can watch all the 24/7 news outlets get absolutely livid over such a wasteful expenditure in this deep dark crisis. Still counting... Posted by: citizen_pain on March 10, 2009 at 12:57 PM | PERMALINKAny bets if Jon Stewart will take him up on that bet tonight? I never bet on a sure thing. Posted by: Mnemosyne on March 10, 2009 at 1:01 PM | PERMALINKIronically and paradoxically, I think Ronald Reagan would think this is a huge waste of money. Spinning, as we speak. Posted by: Walt on March 10, 2009 at 1:03 PM | PERMALINKGiving arms to Iranian terrorists, anti-democratic death squads in Central America, the country's highest tax increase in history (1982), what's not to love? He did as much as other presidents to keep the Truman Doctrine and containment in place, so he didn't slow the inevitable failure of communism either. Posted by: Owen on March 10, 2009 at 1:06 PM | PERMALINKBut seriously, Democrats need to stop playing along with the Reagan myth and start debunking it. I would really like Reagan National Airport renamed after Truman (who won the Cold War), or someone else who didn't support anti-democratic death squads or give arms to Iran. Posted by: Owen on March 10, 2009 at 1:09 PM | PERMALINKPPS - Or give arms and chemicals ingredients for WMDs to Saddam Hussein. Posted by: Owen on March 10, 2009 at 1:10 PM | PERMALINK@Curmudgeon: Except that apparently the overwhelming majority of Democrats supported the legislation, too. Why? Did the federal government spend money to celebrate Lincoln's 200th last month (maybe they did, I don't know)? If not, they sure as hell shouldn't spend a dime on Reagan. And if they did, that still doesn't justify using taxpayer funds on something this frivolous. Yeah, I hope every time a Republican says 'pork' for the next 12 months, Democrats point this out. I just wish the Dem caucus had voted overwhelmingly against it, instead of their usual 'win by losing' approach. Posted by: David Bailey on March 10, 2009 at 1:16 PM | PERMALINKHow does an earmark like this get a 371-19 vote approval? Are these earmarks buried in other legislation, or are they bundled together with creditable ones? Is it a quid pro quo deal, or is it accepted by Democrats to give them a cudgel as Curmudgeon observes? Whichever. $1 million may be loose change beside $1 trillion, but it's no chicken feed for the average taxpayer who may never even earn that much in a whole life, with or without birthdays. Many a mickle makes a muckle, as they say in Scotland: it only takes 1000 $1 million to make $1 billion, and it does take so many more of these to get up to $1 trillion. Don't know whether to laugh, cry or jump up and down. Or emigrate. Posted by: Goldilocks on March 10, 2009 at 1:18 PM | PERMALINKA lot of citizens from Wingnuttia also contend that we have been in a de facto war against Iran since the '79 revolution. If this is truly what they think, then I'd love to hear them answer one simple question: Was Reagan a traitor by selling arms to a nation we are at war with? Posted by: citizen_pain on March 10, 2009 at 1:22 PM | PERMALINKThe last honest Republican in Washington, Ron Paul Posted by: Sean Scallon on March 10, 2009 at 1:39 PM | PERMALINKStewarts Take-Down Part Deux of Cramer last night was teh awesome. It was as if they altered the tape it was so perfect. Clearly Cramer talks so much that he doesn't even hear himself. Funny thing, I don't listen to him either. Posted by: Scott F. on March 10, 2009 at 1:50 PM | PERMALINKMaybe we should sell one of the nukes Ronny built to fund his birthday party. I hear his buddies in Iran have some extra oil money. And Dems... WTF??? Do NOT vote to waste money on birthday parties for a crappy president who mocked renewable energy, deregulated us into the ditch, and whose loyal followers would gladly destroy the country and have tried repeatedly to do so. Morons. Posted by: Racer X on March 10, 2009 at 2:03 PM | PERMALINKDavid B., my take on it is as Goldilocks mentioned, which I should have said in my first post. I think the Dems rather gleefully went along with it to show that they're willing to honor Reagan, too, and so they could wave it in the Republicans' faces later. Pretty much a win-win situation for the Dems as far as pure PR goes. Stewarts Take-Down Part Deux of Cramer last night was teh awesome. It was as if they altered the tape it was so perfect. Clearly Cramer talks so much that he doesn't even hear himself. Funny thing, I don't listen to him either. I once got to have a tour of the FBI's mobile coordination vehicle and inside they had something like 10 hard drives that were 4 terabytes each recording everything local from Tivo since sometimes the local news will see things first. The Daily Show must have a similar array, because that's the only way I can picture them having that much footage right at hand. Posted by: Mnemosyne on March 10, 2009 at 2:17 PM | PERMALINK"Rumor has it, the former president had some admirers in the corporate world. They may have been willing to chip in a few bucks." Of course -- esp since most or all of it would be free money for them anyway, coming directly from taxpayer-funded Bailout Bux. Posted by: smartalek on March 10, 2009 at 2:37 PM | PERMALINKLet me be the first to suggest that a bunch of frat boys dig up his body and do with it what they will. He was a jackass and a fool who could separate fiction from reality. A man who upon realizing that his policy cost the lives of many Marines in Lebanon, decided to invade Grenada. He sucked as President. Cheers, Alan Tomlinson Posted by: Alan Tomlinson on March 10, 2009 at 5:58 PM | PERMALINKFWIW, the Reagan family was probably vastly more gratified by Obama's swift reversal of the stem cell ban. Posted by: Steve Paradis on March 10, 2009 at 10:21 PM | PERMALINK
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