Paul Ryan Brings Home the Bacon: A Quarter of a Billion in Stimulus Money for his District

Hypocrisy, thy name is Paul Ryan.

Classic Paul Ryan Expression.  

Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan, who decries "big government" and "big government" spending, who voted against the stimulus (officially the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act), not only petitioned various agencies to get stimulus funds for his Wisconsin Congressional district, but his district also raked in at least a quarter of a billion bucks of various stimulus projects.  The counting is just beginning for this hypocrite.

He supported TARP, the bank bailout passed in October 2008, in the waning days of the Bush administration, but he opposed the ARRA stimulus, designed and supported by the new President Obama and the Democrats in Congress.

Why did his district get a dime?

Now, you tell me:  If this guy opposed government spending and Keynesian economics so much, why did his district get one penny of hard-earned tax dollars?  And why was he petitioning the various department heads a few months after the stimulus was passed for money for specific projects in his district?  

I'm not going into the specifics of his requests for stimulus money.  If you don't believe me or want more information, check out this Rachel Maddow clip.  Every other news outlet is starting to report on this as well.  

How Much Did Wisconsin's First District Get?

But I started to wonder how much the first Congressional district of Wisconsin got altogether in stimulus funds.  Well, I've just started looking, and it's a nice chunk of change.  Do Ryan's conservative anti-big-government constituents realize that their hero brought home plenty of bacon to the good people of southeastern Wisconsin?  Probably not.     

So, from www.recovery.gov., the government's site which publishes recovery projects and statistics, here is a partial list of cities in Ryan's district that have received recovery funds. I'm not saying Ryan specifically asked for these funds or projects for his district, but, as he opposed ARRA, why were any of these cities in Wisconsin's first getting recovery money at all?  Maybe the Democrats should have played hardball with these hypocritical Republicans:  Unless you support ARRA by voting for it and talking it up, we're not going to give your district one red cent. 

Wisconsin cities in Ryan's district which got a buck or two or three...

I haven't finished reviewing the extensive data at recovery.gov, but these are among the biggest cities benefiting from stimulus bucks: 

• Kenosha received 113,000,000 in recovery funds.
• Racine ...      58,000,000
• Janesville .... 35,000,000
• Oak Creek...  18,000,000
• Burlington...  12,000,000
• Caledonia...   21,000,000
• Lake Geneva..  4,000,000

I'll have to finish over the next couple of days, but so far, Ryan's district, represented by a man who did not support ARRA,  raked in at least 261,000,000, yes, that's millions, in recovery bucks:  A quarter of a billion bucks to a district represented by a guy who doesn't believe that government creates jobs or can actually do any stimulating of the economy.
Everyone of these anti-ARRA Republican hypocrites, not just Ryan, should be telling their constituents exactly what their district received from ARRA and how it helped their towns. 

I have to cross check the towns to see which ones are in the first Congressional district so completing this task is a bit time consuming. 

The data can be found here, at  Recovery.gov