Red-state welfare: the hypocrisy of the tea party

The New York Daily News has done an incredible piece about how the states governed by Republicans, the anti-handout, bootstraps crowd, actually gets more federal money back then they pay in taxes. Should anyone be surprised at this point? It's more hypocrisy from the Paliners, and the Paulers and the Teabaggers.

At this point, my suggestion to them is this: leave. Go. Try and make it on your own and see how quickly you become an impoverished third-world hellhole.

But to stand up and scream about how repressive the federal government is when you're reaping the benefits of the work of the blue states is startlingly stupid. Or as they call it, Monday.

Alaska gets $1.84 in federal spending for every dollar it pays in federal taxes. We in New York get just 79 cents on the dollar.
Which means we subsidize Alaska even as it enjoys a $2 billion-plus budget surplus.

Even as New York faces a huge deficit that will require ever more painful cuts.

[...]

Maybe there will be more reality shows featuring other big names in the Tea Party who call for cuts in government spending even as their home states are subsidized by the rest of us.

There could be Sen. Jim DeMint's South Carolina, which gets $1.35 on the dollar.

There could also be Sen.-elect Rand Paul's Kentucky, which rakes in $1.51.

Compare those states to two that are in financial crisis and suffer an even worse balance of payments than we do in New York.

California receives only 78 cents on the dollar.

And New Jersey gets just 61 cents, though it does have a hit reality show.

h/t Cesca