$10M Peruvian Green New Deal, Frog Mating and Cheese: Rand Paul Exposes Wasteful US Spending
From spending $10 million on a Peruvian Green New Deal to spending almost half-a-million dollars studying frog mating calls in Panama, Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky is pointing the finger at waste in the federal government.
Paul released what he called his “Festivus Report” on his website. Festivus was a fictional alternative to Christmas that was a long-running gag on the comedy show “Seinfeld.” It included such activities as feat of strength and the one under which Paul’s report falls — airing of grievances.
“Happy Festivus! Another year gone already. It seems like just yesterday I was sounding the alarm over a $20 trillion debt, and now the U.S. has pushed past $23 trillion! The more things changed in 2019, the more they stayed the same,” Paul wrote in his introduction to the report. “Hollywood continued going back to tried and true classics, releasing hits like “The Lion King” and “Aladdin.” And the federal government clung to old ideas such as failing to fund the government on time and spending even more taxpayer dollars.”
“I am highlighting a whopping $50,463,462,292.35 of waste, including a study of Panamanian frog mating calls, sending low-quality textbooks to Afghan students, and a grant to fund a Peruvian Green New Deal. It must need exporting after the Senate unanimously opposed it! So, before we get to the Feats of Strength, it’s time for my Airing of (spending) Grievances! ” he wrote.
The Peruvian project was funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development.
“USAID is committing ‘up to’ 10 million American taxpayer dollars ‘to develop new and innovative alliances with the private sector that advance environmentally-friendly economic development (i.e. green growth) in Peru.’ They add, ‘The envisioned activities will facilitate private sector financing and investment in value chains that lead to improved management of natural resources and a reduction of GHG [greenhouse gas] emissions,'” Paul wrote.
“It wasn’t enough for the federal government to waste taxpayer funds on boondoggles such as Solyndra. Now it wants to go abroad and do the same!” he wrote, referring to a failed energy company startup that cost taxpayers more than $500 million under the Obama administration.
Paul noted that the National Science Foundation awarded $466,991 to study frog mating calls in Panama.
“In a look at the effects of urbanization, the study examined the differences between the mating call in the city and in the forest, including its likelihood of attracting midges and bats in each of those environments,” he wrote.
“Panamanian frog mating calls may sound different in forests and cities, but all this use of your resources sounds like to us is waste,” he wrote.
Paul also chronicled another USAID program, this one in Serbia.
“USAID spent part of a $22 million ‘Sustainable Local Development Project’ training the staff at the Regional Center for Agricultural Development in Sjenica, Serbia, to follow the cheese standards of the International Organization for Standardization and help producers adopt best practices,” he wrote.
“So American dairy farmers dealing with the realities of this situation might be cheesed off to learn their government worked to strengthen competition and the European cheese market — using their own tax dollars to boot! ” he also wrote.
USAID featured in yet another one of Paul’s programs.
“If we told you the U.S. government was spending money to address illiteracy in the United States, you might not object. But what if we were to tell you the U.S. is spending $20 million teaching Laotians their own language? Well, that’s exactly what USAID is doing, committing 20 million American taxpayer dollars to the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, a communist nation controlled by one party,” Paul wrote.
“[F]or some reason, the U.S. government has deemed it appropriate to spend your tax dollars on tackling another country’s issues with education even though, despite all the government funds poured in at home, reading proficiency here shows a lot of room for improvement,” Paul wrote.
“[E]ven after millions upon millions of dollars, the government can’t seem to teach English to American kids, but thinks it can use millions more of your money to teach Lao to Laotian kids.”
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