Political Quotes

“First off, I would like to emphasize that this does not take away funding from the Office of Science. It eliminates a very poorly designed set-aside that is based on spending that is completely unrelated to the actual Office of Science. If the goal of this program were to equalize the funding in the Office of Science, then it should be based on the actual expenditures of the Office of Science so that States that are underrepresented there would, presumably, be able to qualify for these. It does not do that. If it were designed to equalize the spending between States that receive a lot more Federal funding than those that don't, then you would see a very different set of States in this. Particularly the fact that it is not based on a per capita basis is the fundamental flaw in this thing. If you look at those States, the single distinguishing characteristic is not that they are poor or rural or anything else; it is that they have small populations, which means that they are overrepresented in the Senate. One of the main mechanisms for transferring wealth out of large States like New Jersey, like Illinois, like California, and a large number of other States into smaller States are spending formulas that have, frankly, been cooked up in the Senate, where small States are overrepresented and the formulas steer large amounts of money into them. If this were based on a per capita basis, it would, at least, be rational.…”