I was out talking to the Chows this morning and we've decided to make an exception to the rule. We like the Grandma Jo rule, where talking about politics, sex or religion is just not nice, unless of course, you are talking about the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church or the beloved Holy Father, in which case all bets are off and blessings are on. Anyway, we happened to see a piece in the newspaper when we were in Noo York Citty last and we think it's worth bringing up here, mostly because it originated in Montana. And so we don't think Grandma Jo would mind at all.

Seems some of the good people of The Big Sky want their governmental officials to contact the Feds and give them back some of the pork obtained in the last congressional slaughter. Serious. Montana, number 25 in ranking on the highway-pork roster (Chows assume this is a hybrid probably genetically engineered at IDAHO as they have never seen the 4-H kids at the fair with road pigs?), got $4 million for a parking garage in Bozeman. Folks there don't want the money, nor the garage apparently, and instead, want the city to give the money to Katrina relief. Now this $4 million garage was but one item on the $286 billion highway bill. Abby Wisse Schachter of The New York Post wonders what 'highway' projects all the people of New York (who came in #4 on the pork list, which reconfused everyone about who the real porker is--Hilliary or entire federal budget process) might throw in, following The Big Sky's big example.

Hows about...

...$500,000 for renovation of streets, sidewalks and curbs outside The Metropolitan Museum of Art?
...$2 million to enhance the Battery Park Bikeway perimeter?
...$2 million to contract West 79th Street rotunda?
...$3.2 million for walkways and bikeways in Coney Island?
...$8.25 million to study, design and contruct Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway in Red Hook, Greenpoint and the Navy yard in Brooklyn?
...$10 for a parking garage at Harlem Hospital?

The Chows got really worked up when they read the rest of the list:

Ithaca $2 million pedestrian and bicycle paths

Cold Spring $250,000 sidewalk and lighting improvements

Bedford $650,000 bike path

Valley Stream $1.35 million streetscape areas

Warwick $500,000 bike path

Binghamton $5 million improve Front Street

Weedsport $250,000 deer avoidance system

Niagara County $1.5 million bike path

Croton-on-Hudson $2.5 million restore Van Cortlandt Manor entrance

Owego $1.25 million waterfront walkway

Riverhead $2.4 million bike path

Watertown $3 million streetcar enhancement

Elmira $2 million congestion mitigation

Pete says that Hilliary Clinton has totally ignored Club Chow at Bellemaison and that he wants to speak to her immediately about congestion mitigation at the breakfast dishes. Red Dorothy says she could provide a deer avoidance system to the good folks of Weedsport like the one she has going at Bellemaison for far less. And Silvie Ruth says this whole bike path thing has gotten completely out of hand but as it seems to be the shizzie, she's gonna ask Hilliary for the kind that Coney Island got. We don't call her Laura Lunchmouth for nothing. Cleo just sighed and said, It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly American criminal class except Congress.

That Cleo LOVES Mark Twain!

JBelle
Bellemaion
The 'Kan EWA