Economics / Politics

Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul are delighted to go on TV and rail against profligate federal spending. But guess into whose hands a disproportionate amount of that spending ends up in?

“The conservative Tax Foundation says the Bluegrass State received $1.51 back from Washington for every dollar it paid in federal taxes in 2005 (the most recent data I could find on the Tax Foundation’s website.) We need to listen to the people of Kentucky. They don’t want any more federal spending in their state—and they certainly must be appalled by the notion that they’re a bunch of welfare queens, living off the taxes paid by blue states like California (which only gets 81 cents back on the dollar), Connecticut (69 cents), Illinois (75 cents) and New York (79 cents).
“A report in the Lexington Herald-Leader says 80 percent of Kentucky’s Medicaid bill is paid by Washington and more than one in five Kentuckians receives a monthly check from the Social Security System, totaling $8.5 billion a year. Washington also spends over $2 billion a year on flood insurance for Kentuckians, $667 million in crop insurance, and $877 million in mortgage insurance.
“Kentuckians are addicted to federal spending—they’re the Lindsay Lohan of states, the Charlie Sheen of commonwealths.”

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2011-02-15/paul-begala-its-time-to-defund-kentucky/