Phayre’s Leaf Monkeys: You probably have never heard of a Phayre’s leaf monkey. Neither had I, until last week, when the House voted on the reauthorization of the spending for the National Science Foundation. Never mind that the bill increased spending in excess of 25% over 3 years. I found 7 specific items of spending that were in the bill to be of particular interest. They were:
-Study the social relationships and reproductive strategies of Phayre’s leaf monkeys
-Study of the sexual politics of waste in Dakar, Senegal
-Study of the cognitive model of superstitious belief
-Research the archives of Andean knotted-string records
-Study the accuracy in the cross-cultural understanding of other’s emotions
-Research of bison hunting on the late prehistoric great plains
-Study of team vs. individual play
Now, I will give the academics the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps all of these studies have some value to academicians and maybe the results are interesting to those who study these areas. That is not the question. The question is whether or not they rise to the level of public need that commands the use of taxpayer funds. We have a deficit. We are annually raiding the Social Security Trust Fund. The Democrats have proposed the largest tax increase in American history. Should we increase the deficit in order to better understand the sex practices of Phayre’s leaf monkeys? Is it okay to take your Social Security money in order to have archives of Andean knotted-string records? Are you willing to increase your taxes for a report on the sexual politics of waste in Senegal? I’m not.
So, I proposed an amendment to strip these 7 projects and only these 7 projects out of the bill. It would have saved hundreds of thousands of dollars of your money. It failed by a vote of 195-222 on the floor of the House. If we cannot get a majority in this Congress to stop funding things like this, what will they vote to reduce? That’s why I’m so adamant about not increasing taxes on anyone. We have to starve the beast of government because it will not go on a diet by itself.
Oh, and one more thing. Two of the 7 studies are scheduled to take place at the University of California at Berkeley and one at Harvard University. Figures.