Former presidents cost U.S. taxpayers big bucks;'77 to 2000=$370 million

[Algorem]

http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070107/NEWS09/70107004/-1/NEWS

tab from 1977 to 2000 is pegged at $370 million

By BENJAMIN ALEXANDER-BLOCH
BLADE STAFF WRITER


...Besides the $183,500 he received last year from his presidential pension, Mr. Ford also received $120,247 in a congressional pension. Former Presidents Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush, and Bill Clinton each received presidential pensions of $183,500 last year.

Mr. Bush also received a congressional pension estimated at $65,000 a year...

Now multimillionaires, many sitting on corporate boards and receiving more than $100,000 for speaking engagements, ex-presidents are no longer in the Harry Truman mold.

Pete Sepp, spokesman for the National Taxpayers Union, wonders about “the exorbitant level of presidential pensions in an age where ex-presidents are solid gold.”...

[benddem]

1. this doesn't include

their secret service protection. I believe only the Carters have refused it.

[eppur_se_muova]

2. Red herring. Spares the US the image of a former president reduced to poverty...

perhaps by vengeful manipulation. Of course, Bu**sh** will try to pull every string to get more money than all his predecessors combinged.

[fob]

3. 370 million over 23 years? How many SECONDS does it take bush*

to spend 370 millon in the iraq folly? Let's see, 2 billion a week is about 300 million a DAY. So it takes about a DAY and a QUARTER to throw away that much, that could provide ex-president pensions et al for 23 FUCKING YEARS!

I hope the NTU is spending more of their time on actual concerns. I mean really. The pension rules are there, if the ex-prez's qualify, then what's the problem. Although I would support a change that would garnishee bush*s salary and pension and whatever else until the trillions he*s stolen has been repaid, with interest and a jail term.

[valerief]

4. Those presidents cost a lot of dead-presidents! nt