Really? A green link to the front page of the site? Every time I like a Slate piece, should I just link to Kaplan Test Prep?

/Check out this awesome Explainer (new window) piece!

Hard to believe.

Sex Panther

Yes, they do. A lot of the money is certainly being pissed away, but the errors in addition are yours.

The robber barons, corporateers and kleptocrats have cleaned out the national treasury.

There is nothing to see here, citizen. move along...

Do you feel safer and superior now, republitards?

Jeez, I wonder which PAC/sponsored-to-the-hilt-think-tank is behind this. And I wonder where they were from 2001-2008?

Is this a problem for any company? No.

Seriously. I know where every cent of our corporate income comes in from and every cent of expense that goes out.

Why should it be a problem for Obama? I assume he has a budget. Doesn't he or someone he hired have Quick Books?

Our government's financials are a good indicator of how efficiently it operates & how much corruption lies underneath.

If an agency has difficulty accounting for how billions of dollars were spent, how much faith should you have that those missing billions were spent wisely? Answer is not much, especially since the billions that we can account for are often not well spent either. Dollars that "go dark" should be a warning sign.

I'm glad ClearSpending is taking time to try to make sense of it all.

P.s. I'm interested in knowing why their scorecards have trended sharply down over the last three years... my guess is that the recession is throwing government finances into chaos. I don't feel Obama has made either a positive or negative impact here.

You know you can't trust a black man to budget money properly.

Delay: Is this a problem for any company? No.

Seriously. I know where every cent of our corporate income comes in from and every cent of expense that goes out.

Why should it be a problem for Obama? I assume he has a budget. Doesn't he or someone he hired have Quick Books?

I wish our state and federal governments had to meet our state and federal accounting standards for corporations. That would solve a lot of issues, right there.

Gee, it's not as if this is a FAQ (new window) or anything on usaspending.gov

meta-derp is now in effect, please do not venture outside unless accompanied by a non-idiot

This is Obama's Bush Administration.

calbert: House of Tards: Really? A green link to the front page of the site? Every time I like a Slate piece, should I just link to Kaplan Test Prep?

/Check out this awesome Explainer (new window) piece!

makes sense to just green headlines without clicking the link

just submit the front page to CNN, NYTimes, MSNBC... pick some story for the headline, and boom, insta-green

(happened yesterday also when some genius just submitted the front page for the Sydney Morning Herald, and it went green)

need something with a familiar link that will not confuse you too much? try this: link to boingboing.net (new window)

but then other people will come and and whine "why do you link to this site and not to the actual site directly. it's all about making a stink about nothing when something gets greenlit with you guys

actually, I take that last comment back. The link to the boingboing site that Tetzlaff posted above said clearly the data was from 2007, 2008, 2009 so it does appear they're looking to hold the current administration to improve their accounts over the previous one.

and that's really not a bad goal.

Man On Pink Corner: They don't add up because the Federal budget is too big for a 64-bit integer. Do the math modulo 0x10000000000000000 and it will work out fine.

FYI the Federal Budget spending was $ 3.52 trillion last year, that number fits in 42 bits.

SomeAmerican: I wish our state and federal governments had to meet our state and federal accounting standards for corporations. That would solve a lot of issues, right there.

Thanks for your post. Since I run a tech company that pays our folks bi-monthly it is important to me that they get paid. I know how to do it and my books are open to inspection.

On the other hand, there are some federal government folks that won't show their books. Speaking as a Democrat, this is nuts.

Looks like someone read the FAQ and then used that information to set up a critical web site. Low hanging fruit.

ansius: Jeez, I wonder which PAC/sponsored-to-the-hilt-think-tank is behind this. And I wonder where they were from 2001-2008?

Link (new window)

I unno, I'd have to look through the names to NAME NAMES for other crazy PAC, but it was hard to find.

You expect the government to tell you the truth? *That's* the scary part, to me.

The real figure is 113%.

so 70% was wasted on the wars? I would believe that.

When you own the printing press, you're financial numbers don't have to make sense.

Too-Tall: When you own the printing press, you're financial numbers don't have to make sense.

"your" damn you, not "you're". Arggggg!

I'm always glad to see things like this. I don't think you'll hear dispute from anyone that there's waste in our government, but judging by our two political parties, it seems like the options are either:

(1) Call for abolishment of agency/program X, with no regard whatsoever to the consequences, and with no awareness of what the original problem it was trying to solve was; or

(2) Claim that the program will be reformed, absolutely fail to do so, pat self on back for saving program.

Sweeping changes are easy to call for. Abolish Medicare! They're abstract; we don't have to think about the actual, real consequences of that action. To me, this is the fatal flaw of the Tea Party movement: like the Iraq War, there's no planning for afterwards. The free market will just fix everything via the invisible hand and faeries.*

You know what's hard? Nuance. Specificity. The actual basis of good government. Perhaps I was too optimistic, but the Democrats have really been a failure in terms of making laws that are actually smart. The loss of the public option, and replacement with the individual mandate, was unforgivable in this regard, in my opinion. Ditto the massive stimulus plan with extremely murky accounting. I'm sure there are many more examples.

The government is far too large for any one person to wrap their head around, but to a certain extent this stuff can be crowd-sourced if it's available to everyone. We can leverage people's partisan instincts; the liberals can go after defense contracts and military spending, and the conservatives can go after the entitlements. I don't care what your motive is as long as the effect is to make government better.

My biggest regret with the right has been the pure cynicism with which they have approached this project. Even if the ultimate abolition of entitlement spending is your goal, there are a lot of steps that could be taken to make government better today. But that would increase confidence in government and decrease the hysterics about government spending, all of which is unhelpful for Republican electoral chances. So rather than a call for good government, we hear the call for no government at all. It is a betrayal of democracy itself.


* To be fair, (some) libertarians do try to engage with it more deeply. But it's not necessarily fair to compare them, because the libertarians are much smarter.

B A [TotalFark] Quote 2010-09-08 07:48:17 PM
If I were this innacurate with my employers money (we are their employers & it is our money) I'd be in prison for misappropriation, embezzling, and fraud.

>>>

Do you print your own currency too?

Delay: On the other hand, there are some federal government folks that won't show their books. Speaking as a Democrat, this is nuts.

Federal Reserve Bank, I'm looking at you.


Am I the only one who thinks that both the tax code and spending regulations need to be scrapped and totally rewritten from a white page?

Yoyo: Delay: On the other hand, there are some federal government folks that won't show their books. Speaking as a Democrat, this is nuts.

Federal Reserve Bank, I'm looking at you.


Am I the only one who thinks that both the tax code and spending regulations need to be scrapped and totally rewritten from a white page?

I'm with you.

Big Al:
Do you print your own currency too?

Yes, but keep it under your hat; the local constabulary takes a rather dim view of it.

spankster: The robber barons, corporateers and kleptocrats have cleaned out the national treasury.

There is nothing to see here, citizen. move along...

Do you feel safer and superior now, republitards?

Yes, yes, yes, its all on the Republicans. Got it.

While Executive fatcats light another $50,000 cigar and chuckle at those suckers.

Stop voting for Republicans and Democrats!

NYZooMan Quote 2010-09-08 08:31:55 PM
Delay: Is this a problem for any company? No.

Seriously. I know where every cent of our corporate income comes in from and every cent of expense that goes out.

Why should it be a problem for Obama? I assume he has a budget. Doesn't he or someone he hired have Quick Books?

RACIST!

>>>>

Tell me again who did the 2009 appropriations? Which administration?

Xenomech: Stop voting for Republicans and Democrats!

THIS

Is the obvious tag out sick today?

I was told there would be no math

cgw_niu: Xenomech: Stop voting for Republicans and Democrats!

THIS

So much THIS, but once a big enough pool of voters start to vote against the partisan candidates, the candidates of each party will run as independents.

The obvious solution is to raise taxes and give the government more money for more programs.

untaken_name: You expect the government to tell you the truth? *That's* the scary part, to me.

Thank god someone else is bringing this up!!

I didn't trust the government spin machine during Bush, and O don't trust it under Obama, either. I am daily appalled that so many people I know actually believe the stuff they are told by people that have a direct incentive to downplay anything bad and highlight anything remotely good.

Big Al: suckers

...meanwhile the politician fatcat lights up a TRILLION dollar cigar and blames the smell on other people!

the big gastropod: untaken_name: You expect the government to tell you the truth? *That's* the scary part, to me.

Thank god someone else is bringing this up!!

I didn't trust the government spin machine during Bush, and I don't trust it under Obama, either. I am daily appalled that so many people I know actually believe the stuff they are told by people that have a direct incentive to downplay anything bad and highlight anything remotely good.

THIS. Do you know how to tell if a politician is lying to you? If his lips are moving.