Eight hours. 5,593 pages. $2.3 trillion. Go!

Rand Paul in 2018, criticizing the unwieldy omnibus bill, weighing in at 2,232 pages, now considered a lightweight.

The spending bill is out. Congress, in December, decided to make $2.3 trillion rain.

Included is $900 billion in COVID-19 relief, which is what everybody's talking about. It would provide money to unemployment insurance distributions and $600 to people with an income limit. Gosh, $600 whole dollars. All for the government putting people out of work for nine months. It's so generous it can pay for less than a third of one month's rent for a median one-bedroom in the Bay Area.

Here's a radical idea: how about letting people who are low-risk work and we don't have to do this whole piss on people's feet and pretend we're doing them a favor charade?

Not as much talked about is the rest of the spending bill. It brings up the Dalai Lama. It also prohibits federal funds from going to ACORN, a group disbanded ten years ago. It makes illegal streaming a felony. It implements horseracing safety standards. It forbids the USPS from delivering e-cigarettes. Wait. This is...a spending bill, right? Oh-kay...

Here's some actual spending. Part of the bill directs funding to two new Smithsonian museums, one for women, one for Latinos. It sets aside ten million dollars for gender programs in Pakistan. It bails out New York's MTA to the tune of $4 billion. It gives $15 billion in grants to Broadway. Trump gets $1.4 billion for his border wall. Israel gets $500 million for its military. Palestine gets $250 million in economic aid.

Can we all agree that spending $15 billion on live events in a year where live events are basically forbidden is a bad investment? That giving $4 billion to the MTA that is chronically mismanaged and has low ridership is a bad investment? That a border wall just isn't particularly important right now, even if you're into walls? That gender programs in Pakistan when we can't even figure out our bathrooms domestically probably isn't the best way to go? Even though COVID relief spending doesn't make a whole lot of economic sense, it's still infinitely better to give it to people whose livelihoods were ruined domestically because of government actions than to spend it on Israeli military programs and Palestinian economic relief.

The gargantuan Frankenstein of a bill was foisted into the desks of every congressman and they were asked to vote on it. They had just a few hours to read, comprehend, and consider the effects of all of nearly 5,600 pages of it. I don't care what kind of speed reading classes you have taken before, it's not possible. It was barely possible just to print and upload the damn thing. Maybe if the vast majority was filled with cartoons and pages that read "this page intentionally left blank." Somehow, I don't think that's the case.

Folks! The bill is on the move! pic.twitter.com/AYTztVZaYA

— Garrett Haake (@GarrettHaake) December 21, 2020

So obviously, no one read it. Even if each office hired a thousand interns each to read 5 or 6 pages and create a cliff notes version, then consolidate it all into one "digestible" 200-page report, it would take days. Weeks.

So it was voted down, right? No responsible person would ever sign a $2.3 trillion document without reading it first, right? Our leaders aren't that brazenly idiotic to outright admit that they have no idea what they're passing into law, right?

Of course, they passed it! This is how governments work! A congressman wants something passed that isn't popular, so they piggyback their pork onto some high-profile "must-pass or else the government will shut down" bill. Then everyone else does it because if they don't, it means their pet project will be left behind in the dust, leaving their lobbyists and major donors wondering why they're supporting that person's reelection campaign. 

Even chronically brain dead cretins like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez had at least a reflexive "wait, this is wrong" moment before spinelessly voting yes on it, which is more than I can say about just about every establishment Democrat and Republican who voted yes without any misgivings. The usual suspects of principled congressmen voted no on it like Justin Amash (L-MI) and Thomas Massie (R-KY), along with a surprising Rashida Tlaib (D-MI). Maybe she accidentally pressed the wrong button. My favorite Democrat, Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) seems to be improving on her economic front as well, also voting no. 

When the bill landed on Donald Trump's desk, he threw a fit and complained about all of the wasteful spending on it, outlining a list of things he thought should be deprioritized in favor of expanded COVID relief. He demanded a $2000 check for COVID relief (a separate bill for this thankfully later died in the senate, as it attempted to repeal Section 230 within it). He didn't get any of his demands, but he signed the bill anyway. Art of the Deal, my ass.

And that, my friends, is how the government spends your money.