December 28, 2005

I'm an excellent driver

By Nathan Moore
Lt. Governor John Wilder (D-Outer Space) has admitted to something near $30 million in legislative waste. Bob Krumm notes

Lt. Governor John Wilder thinks that a month-long special ethics session is unnecessary. Instead, he argues, the ethics legislation could have been considered during regular session.

"We don't do anything the first six weeks we're there (in regular session). We don't pass any bills for six or seven weeks."

Ummm, Senator, are you saying that you lead an organization that doesn't "do anything" for six weeks every year? How much taxpayer money have you wasted over the last quarter-century?

Well, let's figure it out. John Wilder has led the Senate since 1971. Thirty-five years times six weeks a year, times seven days a week, is 1,470 days--over four full years of time that the Lt. Governor says has been wasted while the Legislature has been in session. At $19,800 per day, the estimated daily cost of running the Legislature, John Wilder admits to having wasted 29,106,000 of the taxpayers' dollars under his watch.