The High Price Tag of the Obama Library
5th May 2014
In Illinois, there is no danger that extra cash will be squandered, because there is no extra cash. But state legislators know you can’t be too careful. So they are considering approving $100 million for the Barack Obama Presidential Library. Without that promise, Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan fears, the president might put his monument somewhere else—Hawaii or New York or maybe Nairobi.
Without that promise, of course, Illinois would also save $100 million. A government that already spends and promises well beyond its means has no business taking on any new obligation it can possibly avoid. But if Illinois lawmakers were susceptible to logic or arithmetic, the state would not be insolvent to begin with.
Well, considering that for the next couple hundred years many people will be wanting to know What the fuck was he thinking?, it doesn’t seem excessive.