Hollywood bailout?

In the name of stimulating the economy, Democrats have gone on the largest spending spree on record. It's payback time for votes: unions, ACORN, Hollywood, illegal aliens, sexually-transmitted diseases, you name it.

President Obama had the audacity to look the American people in the eye and say that his economic recovery act had been stripped of earmarks.

Interesting wording.

Dick Morris said that technically, "earmarks" are what Congressional members put in the bill in order to get something back for their states. So with Obama's semantic somersault, does that mean all the pork in this spending bill are his own doing? Perhaps such semantics allow him to feel confident that he could pass a lie detector test. (It's reminiscent of Clinton swearing that he "did not have sexual relations with that woman.") Depends on your definition of a term.

Obama was careful not to use the word "pork" since the alleged stimulus bill is loaded with it. The two most ridiculous pork items: $80 million for ACORN, the same organization being investigated in many states for voter fraud; and $256 million for Hollywood. That's a quarter of a billion dollars! What for?

Didn't Hollywood also receive millions of dollars in the infamous Wall Street bailout last year? Why did they need to be "bailed out" along with banks? Since when has Hollywood helped the national economy?

Now that Obama has placed a cap on all CEOs' salaries if their company received taxpayer money in the bailout, will he also cap actors' multi-million dollar salaries? After all, he should be consistent. Actors get paid more than they're worth regardless of whether the final version of the film is successful or bombs at the box office. Can the President change Hollywood contracts, too?

He won't, of course, since Hollywood is a huge Democratic voting base.

Don't get me wrong: I find it despicable that CEOs can take home millions of dollars when they've run their companies into the ground and have cost many employees their jobs. But as my husband tells me over and over again, that was in the contract that the board of directors agreed to.

What about athletes' high salaries? The team owners are willing to sign a contract guaranteeing top players millions of dollars over a few years time in hopes of a championship, which in turn makes money for the owners. If the athlete gets hurt or doesn't perform as expected, the owner can't renegotiate the contract or put a cap on the salary.

Don't be surprised if franchises start asking for government handouts. If governors and mayors across the country are doing it, why not everyone? The Wall Street bailout was the first in this slippery slope, with no end in sight.

Clearly a bias exists against businesses. I hate golden parachutes, but the government has no business changing contracts. If it chooses to anyway, it should do so consistently with all the companies and organizations receiving government money (aka. pork) - even ACORN and Hollywood.

Moreover, this spending bill demonstrates bias against any religious organizations, which will not see a dime from the government trough. All religious schools are specifically excluded from the huge "investment" in education.

And the government in control of a database of medical information for all Americans? We have no rights, no privacy, and no option to "opt out" of such Orwellian measures. Gee, has a government computer ever been compromised? I don't suppose we can trust our information will be used only by the medical community; if so, wouldn't the medicos be in control of the information instead of the government?

Of course, I'm sure members of Congress will be able to exclude their private information from being listed. After all, they're not required to pay taxes - like we do - to pay for all the pork they want, do they?

Or is tax evasion just for the socialist Democrats?