The average elementary social studies textbook defines ‘government’ as ‘the people who are in charge of making the rules and managing the constitution.’ Government officials ignore this basic definition and take their position above and beyond. Often, exaggerating their position leads to pork barrel spending. Pork barrel spending is the act of using government funds on local projects that are primarily used to bring more money to a specific representative’s district. Basically it’s all one kiss up game that, in reality, is just one big waste of money.

There are politicians who blow $57,000 on gold-embossed playing cards for Air force two. Those playing cards must be pretty impressive to be leeching off tax payers’ money just for visual appealing pieces of layered pasteboard. Then you have those who spend $144,000 to study if pigeons follow human economic laws. If pigeons, do in fact, follow human economic laws, they can also pay taxes along with the rest of the public. We might as well give them citizenship in America!

$800,000 spent on a bathroom on Mt. McKinley? What could possibly be in that bathroom that makes it $800,000 worth? Gold embossed toilet paper? The last recorded successful attempt to the peak of Mt. McKinley was done by two men, Jim Wilson and Jim Blow. They must have really wanted to use the bathroom.

Now, the question is, how does this benefit the 314,570,682 people of the United States? Let’s return to the definition of ‘government;” “The people who are in charge of MAKING the rules and MANAGING the constitution”. Huh, that’s strange. Nowhere in that context does it call for spending $219,000 on teaching college students how to watch television, or $100,000 to learn how to avoid a falling spacecraft. Whatever happened to the basic needs? I believe there is a certain limit to luxury spending, especially when the source of income comes from the people. ?Taxpayers work hard to keep up with living expenses. If they were aware that their money was being contributed to a $1.2 million project on studying the breeding habits of the woodchuck, they would definitely not be happy.

The government spent $1 million dollars to study why people don’t ride their bicycle to work, probably because it’s really hard to avoid a falling spacecraft on a bike.

Allow me to throw some statistics at you. In the year 1997, $14.5 billion was spent on 1,596 projects. In 2005, $27.3 billion was spent on 13,997 projects. Since 1991, the Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) has identified 109,978 projects totaling to $308 billion.

"Congress's propensity to earmark federal spending is rising at an alarming rate and, if allowed to continue, will soon account for a substantial share of federal discretionary spending." says Ronald D. Utt, Ph. D. If this excessive spending is not resolved, the national debt will only increase to an even more exaggerated number most wish not to acknowledge. Thousands turn to millions and millions turn to billions. These swine should be sent to a meat packing factory in the 1900s.

A study must be performed on why congressmen feel the need to trash millions of dollars on useless projects. Maybe then will we unveil one of the greatest mysteries of American mankind.