The controversy over inaugural spending

[Jazzman]

Originally Posted by Gn2Dlnd

But it's certainly within my rights to criticize wasteful expenditures by the government. I don't care if it's tax money or private donations, it's still incredibly wasteful spending by our government when a war that the Bush administrastion created has caused so much damage and financial need.

But that's the flaw in this argument. It is not spending by our government. If the spending is derived from contributions made by private citizens, or corporations, it is not government spending, whether the President solicited it or not. Unless the expenditures come from budgets funded by taxes, they are not government spending.

If this gala had been paid for with tax money, I’d be right there criticizing it too. But the simple fact is, it wasn’t.