the tindog coffeehouse

Not content to pass a $700,000,000,000 financial bailout and a $787,000,000,000 “stimulus” package, Congress is now pushing a $410,000,000,000 spending bill that includes a whopping $7,700,000,000 worth of pork barrel appropriations.

So what are we getting for all that money? Just ask Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn, who’s been detailing some of the earmarks on Twitter:

• $4.6 million for oyster restoration in Maryland and Virginia
• $10 million for blue crab disaster assistance in Maryland and Virginia
• $8.5 million for grants to zoos and aquariums
• $25 million for the DOJ’s Weed & Seed program
• $7 million to NASA for science museums
• Another $7 million to NASA for visitor centers
• $1.5 million for pinniped research, marine mammal rescue, and Resurrection Bay salmon enhancement in Alaska
• $1 million to “collect accurate, reliable data on red snapper catch, bycatch and mortality”
• $250,000 for Bluefin Tuna Tagging
• $150,000 for lobster research
• $139,000 for the Interstate Shellfish Sanitation Conference
• $7.1 million for conservation of Hawaiian sea turtle populations
• $2 million for the Center for Grape Genetics in Geneva, NY
• $250,000 for Lahontan cutthroat trout restoration

And according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, the bill also includes:

• $713,625 for Woody Biomass at SUNY-ESF
  
• $951,500 for Sustainable Las Vegas
  
• $24,000 for A+ for Abstinence
  
• $300,000 for Montana World Trade Center
• $950,000 for Myrtle Beach International Trade and Convention Center
• $200,000 for Oil Region Alliance
• $190,000 for Buffalo Bill Historical Center, Cody, WY for digitizing and editing the Cody collection
  
• $143,000 for Las Vegas Natural History Museum, Las Vegas, NV, to expand natural history education programs
  
• $238,000 for the Polynesian Voyaging Society, Honolulu, HI, for educational programs
  
• $381,000 for Jazz at Lincoln Center, New York, NY for music education programs

And my personal favorite: $200,000 for a “tattoo-removal violence outreach program” in Los Angeles.

Whew! That’s a lot of bacon!

So much for President Obama’s pledge of no earmarks for 2009. (What, you didn’t think he was serious, did you?)