People often talk about closing the barn door after the cows have escaped. This is more like issuing the cows a stern admonishment to stay inside, and it will do about as much good:
Invoking his own name-and-shame policy, President Barack Obama warned the nation’s mayors Friday that he will “call them out” if they waste the money from his massive economic stimulus plan. . .
“If a federal agency proposes a project that will waste that money, I will not hesitate to call them out on it, and put a stop to it,” Obama said.
“But I want everyone here to be on notice that if a local government does the same — I will call them out on it as well, and use the full power of my office and our administration to stop it,” he said.
The government(s) will be wasting the money, you can be sure of that. We’ll see how many times President Obama calls anyone out. He might find a Republican governor or mayor to scapegoat, but apart from that, I’m guessing zero.
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