Forrest Gump called it “stupid is as stupid does.”
Last week the Obama Administration did an incredibly stupid thing, they sent Air Force One on a photo op. Well they called it an official photo op but it had to be an incredibly stupid movie stunt.
I’m not going to dwell on where the plane went. I’m not going to comment on just how insensitive the Obama Administration was to fly over that particular city.
I believe millions of Americans saw the television images of hundreds of people scared to death, running for their lives from this potential treat. People from two states dropped everything that they were doing to call their loved ones. The message - Get out now! People were streaming out their buildings in an orderly manner, frightened but composed enough to get on the phone to call others about the cities impending crisis.
In the end it was just a silly joke. I mean really this had to be a joke; no one in their right mind would have authorized a flyover of this city. Imagine the chaos that would cause. The only thing that I can figure is that the President authorized some of his movie buddies to begin filming a new Airplane movie starring O.J. Simpson. What better place to do the filming but a real airplane, with a real fighter escort, and a whole lot of really scared people. You don’t even need to pay the extras in the crowd, they would automatically come running to the set.
Okay I’m done with my rant…. stupid is as stupid does. My issue with this incredibly stupid movie stunt is obviously the insensitivity to that particular city. However I would also like to give a “shout out” to all of the hard working taxpayers that were forced to finance this stunt.
Let me put the costs into perspective.
The problem with Washingtonians is that they don’t understand how much money was involved in the making of this movie. Even the media doesn’t get it. How many times in the past few months have we heard that $19.6 billion in earmarks is just a “drop in the bucket” to the entire bill? Or that “I’m worried that we are not doing enough in terms of spending…” Or even “…we are given Chrysler $4 billion dollars so they can avoid bankruptcy - bankruptcy is NOT an option…”
Let me do a small test before I work through the calculations. Can you say out loud to the person standing next to you this number: $2,978,354,143,102.16? I wonder how many people had to stop and think about it in order to say it out loud? By the way that is a rough estimate of how much our TARP program will end up costing the American taxpayer. But that is another story.
Today’s story is to put into perspective the cost of that incredibly stupid movie stunt.
The cost is expected to be somewhere around $330,000. Not even a drop in the bucket by Washington standards. Just a drip from the spigot.
It may be a drip from the spigot but did you know…?
The Bureau of Labor puts the average weekly earnings of production and non-supervisory workers (preliminary results non-farm payrolls) in March 2009 at $614.20. That equals $31,938.40/year. That grosses out to $3,938 dollars in 2008 federal taxes owed for just one single average taxpayer. I’m just talking federal taxes, not the additional taxes on cigarettes, alcohol, gasoline, social security etc. I’m just talking money that would probably be allocated to the fuel, maintenance, and the crew of that incredibly stupid movie stunt.
Now our gracious government will also give this person some tax relief on the $32k that he earned in the form of exemptions and maybe interest on his home ownership. But to lower the $31,938.40/year amount would really skew my result so lets keep it where it is…
Here we go:
Yep I calculated it right. The average wage earner WILL NOT be able to pay off this bill in his lifetime. It will take almost TWO full-time employees their entire working careers to pay off this one stupid movie stunt.
If there is ever going to be some form of fiscal constraint in Washington then it will take people who have some sense of money. What is the real cost to society for one incredibly stupid movie stunt? If it is going to take 2 people their entire working careers to pay for this event is it worth it to society? Can society afford these types of luxuries?
I heard and read that the President was furious over this event. Maybe he is sensitive to the demons haunting this particular city. I wonder if he even gave the costs of the event another thought? What is your best guess? Did the President give the costs of the incredibly stupid movie event a 2nd thought? Do you think the President can say $2,978,354,143,102.16 without thinking about it?
Would someone please ask anyone of importance in the Obama Administration to rent the movie Forrest Gump? I mean really even Forrest knew that “stupid is as stupid does.”
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Authors Footnote: The Obama Administration couldn’t keep letting our money burn a hole in their pocket for long… they also flew Air Force One to Missouri in the same week. Now we need 4 or 5 average income earners to work their entire lives just to pay for one week’s worth of jet fuel.