Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Super Users and Pork Spending

There is a groundswell of what can only be termed disgust at the way the federal government is attempting to waste all the taxpayer money on pork projects and welfare state programs. Disgust!

The state of affairs reminds me of the story of cheating at the poker site UltimateBet.com. The poker site was designed with certain insider "super user" accounts that would be able to see all the cards being played in any hand. The idea was to have a couple of accounts able to make sure everything was running smoothly the way it was designed to do.

Things went wrong when the super users realized that they could use these accounts for their own benefit. It's impossible to lose at poker if you know what the other player's hole cards are. The people who played at UltimateBet probably never would have known they were being cheated if the super users didn't get greedy. I mean it would have been easy for a super user to just win a couple of big pots a night and live a rather lush lifestyle. Instead people who didn't understand the mechanics of poker got hold of a couple of super user accounts and they decided to try and win every hand. They got greedy and the players noticed. The players noticed and they got pissed off. Now anyone who knows anything about poker stays clear of UltimateBet.com.

Likewise the federal government has some super users. The President is the biggest super user of them all followed by the Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader.

In the past the government super users didn't get greedy (often) but when they did it was viewed as scandal - think FDR trying to stuff the Supreme Court. None of the greed of the past can match today's naked grab for money though. What is trying to be done in the name of stimulus is just pure disgusting. I am glad that people have noticed. I'm glad people are pissed off. Just like how the super users who toppled Ultimatebet.com didn't understand the mechanics of how poker is played - today's governmental super users don't seem to have a clue on how the economy runs. That much is perfectly clear.

The legacy of Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid may end up being that they turned the Democratic Party into the UltimateBet of political parties.

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