Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Soon All Roads Will Lead to Chicago

In what must be one of the most remarkable coincidences in the history of bald-faced snatch and grab politics, the state of Illinois has already filched over $629 million from the available pool of stimulus funds allotted by the Department of Transportation “since the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act became law Feb. 17” http://www.chicagobusiness.com/cgi-bin/news.pl?id=33663&seenIt=1. This accounts for over 12% of the road and bridge projects approved so far by Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood’s (Friend of Blago-Illinois) department.
If the funds were to be equally dispersed over the entire 57 states http://michellemalkin.com/2008/05/21/barack-obama-gaffe-machine/ Barry “King of the Road” Obama’s homeboys would be tussling over 1.76% of the orange-barrel booty. While fellow Earmarking Illini on the Obama team made much of the fact that LaHood actually paid his federal income taxes, his nomination as DOT Secretary was actually delayed due to ethical questions surrounding his penchant for steering Federal cash to his home state:
“The (Washington) Post reported this morning that LaHood, a seven-term Republican Congressman from Illinois who retired last month, has close ties to a Republican power-broker indicted in the pay-to-play scandal that also led to Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich's recent arrest. The story also documented LaHood's sponsorship of $60 million in congressional earmarks last year, and how at least $9 million of them directly benefited his top campaign donors.” http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2009/01/14/lahood_confirmation_hearing_po.html
You don’t suppose any of these highway funds will find their way into Obama-LaHood donor’s pockets, do you?
If our recent trip to the Richard Daley satrapy is any indication, the highway funds will be used to provide additional toll booths on the cities highways. Apparently forcing drivers to exit once every four exits and pay tolls is providing insufficient tribute to the city to allow for the repair of crumbling interstate surfaces. Perhaps the new coin-collecting cages can be rendered as figural Obama heads, with his gaping maw gobbling up any cash left in Windy City driver’s pockets.

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