Click and watch the video. This is costing Americans about $600,000 a day.
http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/v...g-taxpayers-14076274


[Edited by Cliff Pennock: Changed subsection to "Politics". Please do not knowingly click the wrong subsection!]

Dollar coins will never reach mainstream use as long as paper dollars are in use.
I prefer the dollar coins over paper myself, but since so few places use them, I never get them in change, so I have to go buy them at the bank if I want to use them.
Considering how much stuff costs these days, how often are you buying something with singles instead of a $5 or larger bill?
They do need to decide if the presidential coins need to stop. There's enough of a supply for circulation for a while. It would save money in the long run to keep them, end paper dollars and then only start minting more dollars when necessary.

They produced tons of Sacagawea dollars that are still sitting in warehouses that were never circulated, think they would learn.
Heard a few stories about shenanigans inside the money system that are mind blowing.
Like to share them but would have to get a new identity first.

That's one of the best kept secrets. I didn't even know about them. Our Northern Friends use their Loonies(sp?), so, who knows, maybe some day we'll use ours(Loonies)?

The Sacagawea and Presidential gold dollars are interchangeable, as well as the old Susan B. Anthony dollars. I like them for their ease of use in vending machines if nothing else. No more fumbling to find a cleanly pressed paper dollar or carrying a pocket full of quarters. They're all three the same size and weight, so they all work in vending machines.

I'm sorry, but one's are the only thing I can afford to tip the strippers.

The coins processing houses such a Brinks and Armored Transit are tied to the hip and basically controlled by the mint.
They do the wrapping for the mint and the banks. The coin rolls in clear plastic are Brinks', do to a patent they own.

"Junk Coin" is anything that cannot be put back into circulation, like clipped, bent, foreign, mis-strikes, tarnished, water damaged, and coins that would drop on the floor.
Their new super sorters are so sensitive they can reject 99% of the old silver coins. Ever wondered why you seldom see them in circulation any more.

For years they would dump this junk coin into waterways like Lake Michigan, barges full!
But copper is very bad for the echo system so the government made them stop.
So they started burying it until they were asked to stopped that, metals in the water table. So they just stored it.

Junk coin was top secret for the following reason, the banks wanted credit for every penny sent to the wrapping houses, but the junk coin made that impossible. They had no way to process and count anything but clean US coin.
The banks could not get credit for the worthless junk, but he wrapping houses wanted them to believe they were.
So the secret was kept, as "honesty" was the wrapping houses trademark.
Soon it was piling up to a degree something had to be done.

A friend of mine, who had ties in the money system and knew it existed, approached them and offered a solution.
He would buy it, sort it and send the American coin back to the mint for smelting. The mint will not take it unsorted, and no foreign coin is accepted.

They first told him there was no such thing as junk coin, but he knew better.
After a few years of promising it would all be done without ever divulging the amount he was processing, they agreed.
It was piling up and the storage costs were eating then up.
There were no machines that could separate junk coin, and the mint will not take it unsorted, and no foreign coin is accepted.
My friend paid me to design and build them for him, took me about six months.

He is still at it.

And now you know what few do!

I don't know how or why but my store gets tons of the dollar coins. I am really wondering where they all come from. no one wants them as change and brinks gives us a hard time sending the coins to them. We typically get around 50 a week to process. I think some of the backroom internet gaming places are distributing them as prize from the slots.

Disney has been handing out Native American dollar coins as change in their parks here since October of 2009. We have personally witness this and received some of them too. Here is a link to the story on this.
http://disneyparks.disney.g...t-walt-disney-world/

Vending machine companies want $1 coins

I was it the US back when the first dollar coins came out and at the time it seemed no one wanted them as I kept getting them in change. Not only that but I had to try a get rid of them myself as the banks here in Canada do not accept US coins for exchange. All I know is that I still have a bunch of them floating around the house someplace.

More waste.
USDA Gives Millions to Farmers Who Aren’t Actually Farming
http://blog.heritage.org/20...nt-actually-farming/

quote The U.S. Department of Agriculture has doled out millions of dollars in subsidies to farms on which farming isn’t actually taking place, according a new report from government watchdogs. Billions more have gone towards supporting farms that don’t grow the crops for which they’re being subsidized. USDA gave nearly $3 million last year to 2,327 farms that had not grown any crops since 2006, according to the report, released last week by the Government Accountability Office. Of those farms, 622 had not grown any crops since 2001. According to GAO’s analysis, about 2,300 farms, or about 0.15 percent of the 1.6 million farms receiving direct payments in 2011, reported all their land as “fallow,” that is, producers did not plant any crops of any type on this land, for each year of the last 5 years (i.e., 2007 through 2011), as allowed under the farm bill. These producers received a total of about $2.9 million in direct payments in 2011… In addition, according to our analysis of USDA data, 622 farms reported all of their farm’s acreage as fallow for each of the previous 10 years, from 2002 through 2011. While some farms were receiving subsidies without actually growing crops, others got billions even though they didn’t grow the crops for which they were being subsidized, GAO reports: Cumulatively, USDA paid $10.6 billion—almost one-fourth of total direct payments from 2003 through 2011—to producers who did not, in a given year, plant any of the crop for which they had base acres. Specifically, during this period, producers cumulatively did not plant more than 633 million acres with the crops associated with their base acres in a given year. This amounted to an average of 70 million acres each year, or 26 percent of the 268 million base acres on average that are annually eligible for direct payments. GAO concludes with a simple policy prescription: “In light of the need to identify potential savings in the federal budget and questions about the continued need for direct payments, Congress should consider eliminating or reducing [direct subsidy] payments.” In fact, both the House and Senate versions of the legislation contain provisions that would eliminate these direct payments in favor of expanded crop insurance subsidies. GAO also recommends enhanced screening techniques to weed out non-farm land from USDA’s subsidy programs. The agency accepted some of those recommendations, but rejected a proposal to gather a more representative and comprehensive sample of farms that benefit from federal subsidies to confirm that those farms are still in operation.

Another solar power company goes bust after heavy federal subsidies.
http://www.lvrj.com/busines...idies-162901626.html

quote The Amonix solar manufacturing plant in North Las Vegas, subsidized by more than $20 million in federal tax credits and grants, has closed its 214,000-square-foot facility about a year after it opened. Officials at Amonix headquarters in Seal Beach, Calif., have not responded to repeated calls for comment this week, but the company began selling equipment, from automated tooling systems to robotic welding cells, in an online auction Wednesday. A designer and manufacturer of concentrated photovoltaic solar power systems, Amonix received $6 million in federal tax credits for the North Las Vegas plant and a $15.6 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy in 2007 for research and development. Rene Kenerly, a former material and supply manager at Amonix, said the plant has been idle since May 1, when he was laid off. At its peak, the plant had about 700 employees working three shifts a day to produce solar panels for a utility in Amarosa, Colo., he said. "I don't think they had a lot of training," Kenerly said. "There were a lot of quality issues. A lot of stuff was coming back because it had some functionality issues." The Amonix plant was highly touted by political leaders and economic development officials when it opened in May 2011. Company executives said they would employ as many as 300 assembly line workers paid $12 to $14 an hour, plus benefits. Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., and Gov. Brian Sandoval were among the political leaders who lauded the company when it announced it would start making solar panels in the Golden Triangle Industrial Park. Reid in particular has pushed for solar energy research and development in Nevada, drawing parallels between the value of Nevada sunshine and Saudi Arabian oil. "Last year, Amonix CEO Brian Robert­son was tragically killed in a plane crash and unfortunately the company was unable to recover from this difficult time," Reid said Wednesday in an email statement. "Some people will be tempted to use today's unfortunate news for political gain. But I am hopeful that the bipartisan support for this project and the public-private partnership that helped make this and many other projects possible will not be degraded by dirty energy supporters for their own profit or political gain. The clean energy sector is too important to Nevada's future, and I hope that those that publicly acknowledge this will continue to strengthen the bipartisan support for renewable energy programs and incentives that exists in Nevada." Department of Energy press secretary Jen Stutsman noted that the project had bipartisan support from elected officials, including Republicans Sandoval and North Las Vegas Mayor Shari Buck. Amonix was selected for a grant under the Bush administration's Department of Energy in 2007 and eventually received a total of $15.6 million under the grant, she said. "The global solar industry is facing significant challenges that are impacting solar manufacturers worldwide," Stutsman said Wednesday from Washing­ton. "Amonix, an innovative solar startup company with strong backing from Republicans as well as Democrats, received a tax credit to expand its American manufacturing operations and help ensure the United States continues to compete for the manufacturing jobs of the future. While today's news is disappointing, the United States simply can't afford to cede America's role in the growing, highly competitive solar energy industry." The company announced 200 layoffs in January, one month after Robertson was killed in a plane crash in Penn­sylvania, but a representative at the time said the plant was "retooling to redeploy our next generation utility-scale CPV (concentrated photovoltaic) solar power system" and would "ramp back up based on the manufacturing build plan in second half of 2012." Mary-Sarah Kinner, press secretary for Gov. Sandoval, also noted Robertson's death. "After the tragic loss of their CEO late last year, today's news is a sad ending for Amonix," Kinner said. "The governor supported a company which was expanding to Nevada and creating jobs in a targeted economic development sector, which is a priority for him." Nevada's Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation's rapid response team is doing all it can to assist displaced workers in finding new employment, she said. North Las Vegas Mayor Buck and city economic development officials did not respond to requests for comment. Founded in 1989, Amonix is headquartered in Seal Beach with additional facilities in Torrance, Calif., and North Las Vegas. The company had a five-year lease on the North Las Vegas site with Operating Engineers. Donna Alderson, a CB Richard Ellis broker in charge of leasing the building, said she was told the facility would be vacated by the end of July and go on the market for lease at about 30 cents per square foot. The North Las Vegas plant was a joint venture with Singapore's Flextronics Industrial. Amonix founder and chairman Vahan Garboushian had estimated capital investment of $15 million in the plant, including equipment, construction and tenant improvements. Kenerly, the former Amonix manager, said many investors pulled back after Robertson's death and the company was about $100 million in debt, including $34 million owed to Flextronics. Bombard Electric, the Las Vegas contractor that did the electrical work, has placed a lien on the property used for the solar panels, he said. Mitchell "Moe" Truman, president of Pan Western, a transportation service in North Las Vegas, said his company is owed about $60,000 for shipping Amonix products to and from Colorado. "I'll never see that money," Truman said. "I'd like to know how they burned through that money." POLITICAL FALLOUT In July 2010, President Barack Obama talked up the Amonix plant during a Nevada visit to support Reid's re-election, saying tax credits for the plant provided by federal economic stimulus efforts had already made an "extraordinary impact." "Now, the only problem we have is these credits were working so well, there aren't enough tax credits to go around,'' Obama said in a speech at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. "There are more worthy projects than there are tax credits. When we announced the program last year, it was such a success we received 500 applications requesting over $8 billion in tax credits, but we only had $2.3 billion to invest. In other words, we had almost four times as many worthy requests as we had tax credits." The plant's closure quickly became a political football in Nevada's U.S. Senate race. "Congresswoman Berkley, when you voted for the trillion dollar stimulus, you promised it would create 34,000 jobs in Nevada," wrote Chandler Smith, spokeswoman for U.S. Sen. Dean Heller, the incumbent Republican Berkley is challenging. "Nevada lost jobs. Congresswoman Berkley, you pushed $6 million in funding to a company that has created zero long-term jobs for Nevada. It's time for you to admit the stimulus - and your policies - aren't working." Berkley's communications director, Xochitl Hinojosa, responded: "Shame on Senator Dean Heller. While Shelley Berkley and Republican Governor Brian Sandoval are working to make Nevada the clean energy jobs capital of America, Senator Heller is cheering the fact that hundreds of Nevadans have just lost their jobs because he thinks it will help his political campaign. However, Heller's rooting for failure should come as no surprise to Nevada's middle class, given his track record protecting tax breaks for corporations that ship American jobs overseas and defending China's unfair trade policies that are cheating Nevada workers out of thousands of good-paying jobs." Amonix isn't the only solar company to go under after receiving an infusion of federal capital. California-based Solyndra filed for bankruptcy last year after receiving $535 million in federal loan guarantees from the Obama administration. Colorado-based Abound Solar, which received a $70 million loan guaranteed by the Energy Department, filed for bankruptcy in June, succumbing to intense competition from China that has sharply driven down the cost of solar panels, chairman Thomas Tiller said in a Reuters news article.

quote Originally posted by avengador1: More waste. USDA Gives Millions to Farmers Who Aren’t Actually Farming http://blog.heritage.org/20...nt-actually-farming/

Thats an old one....back in the mid-90's I knew a guy who paid the costs on his Piper Comanche by NOT farming....it took him about a week a year to fill out the forms for the various goobymint forms for programs for not growing corn, or potatoes, or tobacco, or raising chickens, or whatever would keep the quota system intact and marketing board happy, and it paid him between 20 and 30k a year...

How about $2.5 million for potato research.
Split between Idaho, Maryland, Maine and Wisconsin, $1.5 million of the cash will go to the competitive potato breeding research program, $700,000 to potato pest management, and $350,000 to the potato cyst nematode special research grant.

$4.8 million for wood utilization research.
The Wood Utilization Research Centers (WUR) is a special grant program meant to increase competitiveness, utilize wood to advance energy independence, and "enable sustainability," according to the WUR website. Proposed by representatives from 11 states.

$17 million for the International Fund for Ireland
According to information on IFI's website, the program was established in 1986 to promote economic and social advance between nationalists and unionists throughout Ireland. Interestingly enough, in 2009 former Irish Ambassador to the United States Sean Donlon called the current political and security situation in Northern Ireland "stable."

$26,360,000 for Memberships to a Fitness Facility at Mayport Naval Station
Proposed by House Military Construction Appropriations Subcommittee member Ander Crenshaw. Membership at the Jacksonville Snap Fitness Center (located 10.5 miles away from the naval station) runs about $44.95 a month. That adds up to more than 48,800 year-long memberships to Snap Fitness -- almost enough to cover each of the 60,400 active-duty personnel, family members, retirees and civilian employees that reside on base.

http://www.cagw.org/reports/pig-book/2012/
http://usgovinfo.about.com/...ess/a/porkdecade.htm

Edit: Thread was under wrong topic. Cliff changed it to right topic.

[This message has been edited by avengador1 (edited 11-27-2013).]

Back on topic. More waste.
http://misguidedchildren.co...t-waste-exposed/7134

Chart of waste, fraud and abuse.
http://americansforprosperi...n-federal-spending-2

quote The federal government spent over $100 billion in taxpayer funds improperly in 2012— one element of that notorious “waste, fraud, and abuse” in federal spending that we hear so much about. Scholars at the Mercatus Center recently released a chart that shows the breakdown of these improper payments across federal programs. Perhaps not surprisingly, the lion’s share of this improper is in three largest healthcare entitlement programs: Medicare Fee-for-Service, Medicare Advantage (Part C), and Medicaid. Combined, these programs account for a whopping $61.9 billion in improper payments. To put that in perspective, $61.9 billion is more than the entire 2014 budget for the Department of Homeland Security. In other words, we’re talking about real money. With the government’s ever-expanding role in healthcare – and the ever-expanding national debt – it’s now more important than ever for the federal government to get a handle on its healthcare spending. Also of note, the federal government spent $2.7 billion in improper payments on the nation’s food stamp program, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which has seen the number of recipients grow from 33 million in 2009 to nearly 50 million last year. This welfare program comprises 80 percent of total Farm Bill spending, and lawmakers made disappointingly few reforms to this fast-ballooning program when they approved the Farm Bill conference report earlier this year. (Bonus read: AFP’s recommendations for reining in SNAP spending.) Taking a broader perspective, this is what happens when government gets too big: Government spends so much that it can’t keep track of it. This is a problem for American taxpayers because it means that billions in taxpayer dollars go toward things that it weren’t supposed to. It reduces program effectiveness. Americans for Prosperity has been active on the problem of improper payments. This past December, AFP released a coalition letter of support for legislation sponsored by Congressman Kingston that puts checks on improper payments. We’ve also worked closely with Capitol Hill offices in recommending ways to reduce waste in food stamp spending—such as instituting income and asset tests at the state level to ensure that beneficiaries meet the federal requirements for the program, and turning the program into block grants to encourage states to spend the money more effectively. It’s one thing to say to oppose waste, fraud, and abuse in federal spending—it’s quite another thing to do something about it. Americans for Prosperity calls on Congress to focus on reducing improper payments in federal spending. Americans deserve to have their tax dollars spent as intended, not wasted on improper payments.

quote Originally posted by avengador1: Oops: Obama Admits Government “Overpaid” $14 Billion In Jobless Benefits, Payments Sent To Illegal Aliens And Jailed Convicts…

Can't trust your sources any more, a1. Barack Obama has never admitted anything.

the Obama Administration is admitting . The Obama administration in not Barack. Just ask him.

quote Originally posted by heybjorn: Can't trust your sources any more, a1. Barack Obama has never admitted anything. the Obama Administration is admitting . The Obama administration in not Barack. Just ask him.

No kidding. At no time is Barack Obama aware of what's the Obama Administration is doing. He has to maintain plausible deniability.