o'waste - NIH Bizarre Spending

Bizarre Government Spending at NIH

From: Traditional Values Coalition  Sent: Tuesday, July 19, 2011 Subject: Bizarre Government Spending at NIH

The National Institutes of Health is a multi-billion dollar arm of the federal government, who proclaims loudly in their mission statement:      NIH is the largest source of funding for medical research in the world, creating hundreds of thousands of high-quality jobs by funding thousands of scientists in universities and research institutions in every state across America and around the globe.      …and the NIH isn't shy about funding some very weird and bizarre things on the side, too.      While our Congress muses upon whether a debt ceiling hike and "revenue increases" such as getting rid of mortgage deductions are necessary, the National Institutes of Health is off spending your hard earned money on outrageous, bizarre grants that are described not only as frivolous -- but OFFENSIVE: A portion of a $9.4 million 10-year line of research included a survey of gay men to determine average penis sizes, "...to better understand the real individual-level consequences of living in a penis-centered society." $154,500 spent asking individuals to mail in their toenails in an effort to research how much toenail nicotine is present versus saliva swabbing, at a cost of $154.50 per batch of toenails. $163,500 spent seeking to explain the "drug-using and sexual behaviors among men who have sex with men (MSM) during a circuit party." $1.2 million spent since 2003 trying to find out if a mother rat, when given cocaine, will abandon her babies.      This is your government hard at work… spending YOUR money!      This is the reason why the United States is mired in debt.      This is the spending the nameless, faceless bureaucrats in our government say is necessary. …and the insiders in Washington refuse to do anything to address the problem, stop the spending, and end the abuse.      Meanwhile, the President continues to attack our conservatives in Congress over whether or not our taxes should go up, whether spending should be cut, and whether our national credit card needs to be whipped out yet again to pay for the National Institutes of Health's reckless spending priorities.      This is not about defunding hard science and research.  This is about defunding highly questionable and morally offensive areas of behavioral research.      In a time where America is under a fiscal crisis, where working families and small businesses are tightening their belts, our government shouldn't be loosening their belts and funding the wacky and bizarre (and outright offensive) funding priorities of the National Institutes of Health. Andrea Lafferty, President, Traditional Values Coalition

---