Money Well Spent?

If nothing else, we can always count on our elected officials in Congress to do what's best. The question that comes to mind, of course, is "best for whom?".

Take DARPA, for instance. You can't deny that the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agencyhas lived up to its charter as being the "technological engine" for the Defense Department in particular and society in general. Why, if it weren't for DARPA, which is credited for launching Internet technologies back in its ARPA days, you might not be reading online what you're now reading. Then there's Global Positioning Systems, Multics (on which modern operating systems owe a big thanks), virtual reality, hypermedia, and a host of other technologies that we now take for granted--all of which have their roots in DARPA. In short, DARPA is really about radical innovation and looking beyond today’s immediate needs, instead looking at tomorrow's requirements.

Alas, Congressional leaders in the U.S. apparently don't see it this way, at least when it comes to funding DARPA projects that may be important down the road, as evident by the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee slashing DARPA budgets. In particular, programs that would suffer cuts include:

• Responsive Computing Architectures -- cut by $3.9 million.
• Security-Aware Systems -- cut by $3 million.
• Automated Speech and Text Exploitation in Multiple Languages -- cut by $6.5 million.
• Integrated Cognitive Systems -- cut by a whooping $60 million.
• Learning Locomotion and Navigation -- cut by $3.8 million.
• Improved Warfighter Information Processing -- cut by $7 million.

Moreover, the committee decided to cut DARPA's Computer Science Study Group -- established to introduce young faculty to DOD-oriented issues in computer science -- from the requested level of $6.6 million to $3 million.

But it isn't like Congress is wanting to save money. After all, it has allocated:

• $1 million for the Waterfree Urinal Conservation Initiative.
• $3.1 million to convert a ferry boat into a crab restaurant in Baltimore.
• $6.4 million for a Bavarian ski resort in Idaho.
• $13,500,000 for the International Fund for Ireland.
• $550,000 for the Museum of Glass in Washington.
• $11 million for a private pleasure boat harbor in Cleveland.
• $500,000 for the Sparta Teapot Museum in North Carolina.
• $320,000 to purchase President McKinley's mother-in-law's house. Funds to rehabilitate the South Carolina mansion of Charles Pickney, a Framer of the Constitution, even though the house was built after he died.
• $2.7 million for a catfish farm in Arkansas.
• $500,000 to build a replica of the Great Pyramid of Egypt in Indiana.
• $13 million for an industrial theme park in Pennsylvania.
• $500,000 for a museum to honor former Secretary of State Cordell Hull.
• $33 million to pump sand onto the private beaches of Miami hotels.

According to The 2006 Pig Book, the total cost of boondoggles such as these is a record $29 billion. By comparison, in 1991 earmarks added just $3.1 billion to the budget.

Think about this: If we would have had the kind of Congressional leaders 50 years ago that we have today, we likely wouldn't have the Internet as a vehicle to kick Congress around.

Posted by Jon Erickson at 09:36 AM  Permalink