Maybe, just maybe

The Daily Caller this morning reported that the Debt Commission that President Obama has assembled will carry a price tag of $500,000. Now I know that sounds like a lot of cold hard cash adding to our debt in order to discuss getting us out of debt but is it really? Let's take a look.

Bruce Reed said that he and a few staffers are collecting a salary. So one would assume that the other seventeen members and some of their staffers will also collect some type of salary. For illustration purposes though, let's just say that the eighteen members of the commission receive a small salary that might equal $500 per weekly session. The commission plans on meeting each week (in person) until their report is due in December, that is approximately 32 weeks. So, again with no intimate knowledge of the exact amount of the salaries, the salary portion of the budget is potentially $280,000 not including any staffers.

Mr. Reed, the executive director of the commission, has also said that the commission will enlist several unpaid staffers as well. Well I certainly hope that they don't ask those unpaid staffers to do any clerical work because that would be in violation of regulations regarding internships wouldn't it and interns of course don't ever do something that someone else could be paid for huh?

Now let's look a the travel and lodging budget. The average priced coach class flight from Raleigh to Washington DC (where I would guess that Erskine Bowles would fly in and out of unless of course he had to travel from elsewhere due to scheduling) is $149 and the average priced coach class flight from Wyoming to DC is $601 (although Alan Simpson has already stated that he prefers to fly first class and take the loss on the difference in price). So allowing for the fact that there is probably a flat fee for each flight instead of a separate amount for each of the eighteen member panel which although the right way to do I doubt that the government works that efficiently, that would put the airfare budget around $288,000. Again for the purposes of this example, let's say that each staffer would stay over in DC one night for each meeting and the average DC hotel is $200 per night. That would mean that the housing budget would be approximately $115,200.

Of course, we don't want anyone to be hungry so I would have to believe that there is also a per diem for food. Let's use a round figure of $100 per meeting, which would add another $57,000 for just the eighteen members of the commission (no staffers).

So even though the commission is meeting in the White House (at least the first time) which alleviates the need for an outside facility rental fee, there is probably at least lunch brought in. One would figure that even if provided by the White House kitchens, the cost is probably at least $20 per person which adds an additional $11,520 to the overall budget. Lest we forget paper and pens, we should add into the budget the cost of at least one legal pad, one ream of copy paper, two pens and two highlighters per panel member per session. That would add another $2384.46 unless of course they don't shop at Staples and instead go to that government warehouse where the toilet seats cost over a thousand dollars.

So without factoring in any money for any staffers that the executive director has already said would be paid, the budget for the above expenses is already$754,104.46. Does this surprise anyone? Are my estimates really out of control?? So once again the people who are tasked with finding a way to get us out of debt are apparently incapable of providing a realistic budget to work within themselves.

Why is it that the Administration continues to think that the American public is too stupid to see the writing on the wall and to do simple math? Why can't these meetings be held over video chat? That idea was squashed according to the Daily Caller's report. I would think that since the Obama Administration thinks that all Americans have a right to broadband Internet then they must have heard of something called video conferencing? Skype is free - use it and some common sense and maybe, just maybe, we'll have a chance!

Klaatu barada nikto

President Obama has created yet another commission to study something. Rather than sitting down with economists himself which would no doubt infringe on his abilities to continue his love affair with his teleprompter on television every other minute, he has created a "bi-partisan"debt commission tasked with finding a way of getting America out of debt. And given the most recent developments (the climate bill) in the realm of bi-partisan politics I am not sure that we should hold our breath.

The heads of this commission are Erskine Bowles, a failed Democratic Senatorial candidate and outgoing president of the University of North Carolina, and Alan Simpson a former Republican Senator from Wyoming. These two will head an eighteen member panel charged with the task of reducing the deficit to $550 BILLION by 2015. The deficit for the fiscal year that ended on September 30, 2009 was $1.4 Trillion so the commission apparently have their work cut out for them.

As the president of the University of North Carolina system, Bowles was ultimately responsible for the budget and in the current fiscal year had to make cuts totaling $162.5 Million. These cuts included 935 jobs. Ninety percent of the job cuts were administrative positions eliminated "in order to protect the Academic core" of the system. Mr. Bowles has also stated that further cuts will have to be made - namely approximately $100 million from the 2010-2011 operating budget - but that those will no doubt unfortunately have to be stripped from the University's Academic core. Convenient that Mr. Bowles has announced his retirement from the presidency before he is associated with the cuts and with the permanent damage that will lead to a path of mediocrity.

After leaving the Senate, Alan Simpson (once named by a tabloid as an alien) taught at the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. In 2001, Senator Simpson became Honorary Chairman of the Republican Unity Coalition (a gay/straight alliance within Republican party that has since disbanded) and then supported a former Democratic candidate (over a much more conservative choice) in the 2002 Wyoming gubernatorial race. So I guess that I shouldn't be surprised at the inclusion a liberal leaning Republican as the Administration's attempt at bi-partisanship.

Is trimming administrative positions, those positions that are usually vital to the day-to-day operations of most of the programs that they will no doubt want to continue to fund, the answer? Once we do that, are we then faced with the trimming of the "Academic core" of America? And will that lead the country down the path of mediocrity - more so than even some say we already are?

I fear that when Alan Simpson this time utters "Klaatu barada nikto" it will be too late to call off the President's destruction of our beautiful country.