President Barack Obama’s trillion dollar stimulus plan ^[1], has morphed into an appropriations bill devoid of debate. The process forgoes any pretense of targeting unemployed people and resources.

For instance, the bill reads “Provided further, That not less than $140,000,000 shall be available for climate data modeling. ^[1]” This raises the question of how many unemployed climate modelers are out there pounding the pavement.

When presented with that question, last Friday, Pat Michaels, former president of the American Association of State Climatologists stated “I don’t know one unemployed modeler.”

Whether or not another $140,000,000 for climate data modeling is a good idea, it is hard to see an immediate, economy-stimulating impact from this item.

What’s the rush? Maybe they need to get all their modeling done before another cool year highlights how bad the models are.