Stop Squandering Federal Funds

How in just a few years can the federal budget go from a surplus, to over six trillion dollars in debt? What has happened in just a few years to cause such a substantial increase in our national debt? I believe the answer is wasteful government spending. In Tax-payer money used for a research project in Argentina... Elizabeth discusses her opinion on the U.S. governments wasteful spending on programs. She provides convincing evidence from The National Institution of Health. They are spending more than $400,000 on a research project studying the sexual behavior of gay men who get drunk in bars in Buenose Aires, Argentina. I agree with Elizabeth that the U.S. Government must stop squandering federal funds on programs that have no useful purpose. Programs using tax dollars need to be evaluated on the merits of the project. In her blog she states, “the U.S. Government must stop wasting our money on useless projects, especially when we are going through an economic crisis.” The mindset of these politicians is that there is an endless amount of tax-payer dollars to spend.

Politicians have been notorious for wasting American tax dollars for many generations, right? Tom Coburn, M.D., a U.S. Senator from Oklahoma, maintains a list of wasteful spending in Washington. The pork report -- how Washington politicians, bureaucrats, and lobbyists are spending your tax dollars claims to have “identified more than $3,571,642,000 in wasteful Washington spending." Coburn is also known for blocking legislation that wastes federal dollars. For instance, twice he put a hold on legislation for the Clark Mount Hood Wilderness, which would have protected wilderness land in 3 states. He strongly disapproved of $10 million for surveying and mapping because it would be wasteful government spending.

NO LONGER A FAR FETCHED CONSPIRACY THEORY

We are giving up huge parts of our privacy on Facebook and we are becoming much more accepting to this lack of privacy. We share our photos, contact information, we pick our five favorite beers, movies,commercials, we list our friends, join groups, and we search for insight into ourselves by taking quizzes like “Which Disney Villain Are You?” With this much information put on this social networking site, there are bound to be risks to our privacy. If you read Facebook’s privacy statement, they are very clear about the fact that they collect data for marketing purposes. In fact, The Facebook privacy policy states: Facebook may also collect information about you from other sources, such as newspapers, blogs, and instant messaging services.

With all this information being gathered about us and being made available to third parties the relationship between Facebook and the Government no longer seems like a far fetched conspiracy theory. Data mining and surveillance programs do exist and the government could obtain a great deal of information from Facebook by data mining. According to Government Increasingly Turning to Data Mining which appeared in The Washington Post $30 million was spent by four government agencies last year on services from data mining companies. Counter terrorism can not be used as a reason to support data mining. According to a National Research Council report identifying terrorists through data mining "is neither feasible as an objective nor desirable as a goal of technology development efforts." False positives will result in "ordinary, law-abiding citizens and businesses" being incorrectly flagged as suspects. To protect our privacy Congress should consider how data mining programs are being used and re-examine existing laws.

Is the large amount of money being spent by the government for data mining justified by finding out that my cousin is doing laundry and yard work the rest of the day, the boy that lived next door to me in the eighth grade is watching The Departed on the DVR, another cousin can not leave the house without Försvarets hudsalva, and my sister finally got the kids and puppy to sleep? Should I be scared that the government somehow got a false positive when I took the "Which Sexy Lady Are You?" quiz and got the result Grace Kelly or when I wrote in my note 25 Random Things About Myself that I love the original Pink Panther movies and that I sing full blast in the car (much to the embarrassment of my teenage daughters)? Would I be flagged as a suspect if I talked about my grandfather moving his family to Pakistan in 1957, or that two of my brothers were born in Asmara?

I am bothered by the amount of information Facebook can obtain about me and sell. That information has the potential of violating my privacy. By using Facebook I am taking a risk that I could be flagged by the Government. But the Government is not exactly sneaking into my bedroom or that of my friends and family. We are inviting them in by voluntarily publicizing our personal lives. We have become much more open to posting intimate information online.

In conclusion, Facebook is a networking site many people use to connect with each other, post their feelings, interests, and ideas online. It does bring into question some disturbing things about how our society views privacy, personal information, and how much information big brother collects about us.