Can America 'weather' Santorum's crookedness?

This is how Republicans take your money and stuff it into the pockets of rich people.

Senator Rick Santorum (R-Pennsylvania) is pushing hard for legislation that serves no good purpose to the public. In fact, it "solves" a problem that has never been mentioned--ever.

Santorum wants to subsidize private weather bureaus. Yup, he's damn tired of the taxpayer-funded National Weather Service giving their forecasts away to the public. These forecasts, which pretty much everybody uses, aren't "free." They are paid for by American tax dollars. And for the time being, Americans are getting their money's worth.

But Santorum is hell-bent to end it. He wants a law that disallows the NWS from "giving away" forecasts by posting them on the internet because--wait for it, it's pretty disgusting--it is "unfair competition" that keeps news services from profiting from them! Yup, Santorum wants Americans to pay for weather forecasts, then deny them direct access to that information, so that some corporations can make a few extra bucks.

Dontcha love it when politicians work for "the people"?

If only this was idiotic or evil. Instead, it's pure bribery. Santorum is literally selling legislation. He has received several thousand dollars in campaign contributions (for 2006) from AccuWeather, which is based in--yep, Pennsylvania. He took their money, then he wrote them and a dozen other PA companies a subsidy bill.

You're a real piece of slime, Santorum.

I've said it before and I say it again: the GOP serves no one but the rich and the corporations. There is no purpose to this bill but to make sure corporations--not the taxpayer--benefits best from public services.