01 Jan 2010 The Inadequacies of a Hundred Billion Dollars, by Ak’Bar A. Shabazz

The Inadequacies of a Hundred Billion Dollars by Ak’Bar A. Shabazz (bio)

It’s great to see the Obama Administration is clear on its priorities.  Too bad these priorities don’t benefit the American people.

Over the last year and a half, we’ve been mired in the worst recession in over a generation.  Despite signs that the economy is beginning to turn around, there’s still double-digit unemployment, inflation and deficits so high it required legislation to legally raise the limit on the amount of debt being passed to future generations. 

America is also engaged in two very costly wars that are bleeding us of human and financial resources. 

Additionally, liberals in Congress are trying to restructure our health care system – a pursuit certain to raise taxpayers’ level of financial exposure.  This all comes as some families are still dealing with the threat of foreclosures in homes increasingly more expensive to maintain.

It is very clear that new spending – and the debt it creates – is something America cannot afford. 

But this reality seems irrelevant when liberals are in power. 

For example, world leaders and their representatives just met at a United Nations conference in Copenhagen under the guise of combating global warming.  In the end, the conference became more of an opportunity for developing countries and failing regimes to get the American taxpayer to fund their domestic operations. 

To start with, how is one supposed to trust the policymaking skills of a group that gave out 45,000 invitations to a meeting in a building accomodating only 15,000 people?  As a result, the Copenhagen conference restricted and excluded the full extent of participants’ views and knowledge through sheer incompetence.

Nonetheless, Hillary Clinton promised to simply give developing countries $100 billion annually.  This is money that should circulate in our own economy instead of through unappreciative regimes and inefficient special-interest groups.

As unprecedented as giving away that amount of money may be, it still seems unappreciated.  One delegate from Bangladesh, a country figured to be a prime beneficiary of the $100 billion, complained to a reporter that there was no assurance the gift did not “recount existing aid.” 

One might like the Obama Administration to be much more deliberate and thorough in protecting American interests and taxpayer exposure before committing so much to regimes that are traditionally not grateful of our charity and can’t guarantee the money will be spent in good faith. 

This all shows how the Obama Administration is out of step with the public.  Furthermore, the recent global warming e-mail scandal raises new questions about the integrity of scientific proponents.  Global warming appears to be the only field of science in which questions are discouraged and supporting research is actively destroyed.  It is also where naturally-occurring emissions such as exhaling humans and bovine flatulence become harmful pollutants in the minds of government bureaucrats.

Al Gore preaches that greenhouse Armageddon is at hand, but temperatures are falling.  What is rising is Gore’s bank balance.  He is slated to become the first “global warming billionaire” due to his environment-related investments. 

It makes one wonder if taxpayers aren’t being taken for a ride – here and abroad.

Americans are growing further and further apart from the White House – and with good reason.  While military and health care budgets are expanding, the Obama Administration wants to ship hundreds of billions of dollars abroad.  As many Americans celebrated abbreviated Christmases, policies based on dubious global warming science and would wreak further economic damage and destroy jobs are seriously under consideration.

Many have tried to say growing dissatisfaction is about Obama’s race.  It’s not about black or white – it’s about green.  A popular president creates opportunity.  He doesn’t ship it overseas.