Comment by thwarted

My understanding of what you say is true, and NASA is a common example of high value cultural and economic outcomes for the pittance the US government budgets/allocates for it.

O'Rourke's take is an interesting read; it is commentary that is meant to be more humorous and entertaining than political, I think he excelled at that in the entirety of Parliament of Whores. It was published in 1991 in a different political climate. He does admit he's doing this for fun, that the takes he express are mostly uninformed about the nature of many of these government departments and programs, and takes a (traditional) conservative (high level, and ahem, naive) view of many government programs. For example, additional quotes from that PoW chapter:

> Training and employment is properly the concern of trainees and employers: $5.7 billion.

> Insurance companies should gladly pay for consumer and occupational health and safety: $1.5 billion.

> If unemployment insurance is really insurance, it ought to at least break even: $18.6 billion.

I shared this for the Circumcision Precept bit; the portions of the quote surrounding that were context.