Remember, Mean Joe Biden is going to protect the integrity of the Treasury. Well, maybe not.
The chief watchdog for spending from the $787 billion stimulus package says it’s guaranteed there will be waste and fraud.
Earl Devaney, tapped by President Obama to track the giant spending plan, also said it will be at least a year before the government gets recovery.gov, the Web site the administration has touted as a key part of its transparency, up and running properly.
“I’m afraid that there may be a naive impression that given the amount of transparency and accountability called for by this act, no or little fraud will occur. My 38 years of federal enforcement experience tells me that some level of waste and fraud is unfortunately inevitable,” Mr. Devaney told state officials charged with coordinating the spending.
“Obviously the challenge for all of us, especially those charged with oversight, will be to significantly minimize such loss.”
The White House hosted the state officials yesterday in an eight-hour conference designed to answer their questions and get their thoughts on how to manage the spending. But federal officials were also clearly worried about how the money would be spent, repeatedly telling them that the future of all federal grants to states rests on their performance.
“Six months from now, if the verdict on this effort is that we’ve wasted the money, we built things that were unnecessary, or we’ve done things that are legal but make no sense, then, folks, don’t look for any help from the federal government for a long while,” said Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.
Alas, we have plenty of experience on how “free” federal funds get used by their recipients, and the results aren’t pretty.
