Obama Knocks Unneeded Government Websites, Enacts Freeze

Prime example of what's wrong with the current administration - penny wise and pound foolish. Deal with 1% of Medicare fraud and it saves twice the cost of maintaining all of these websites. Drink the Kool-aid.

On the other hand, it shows just how tragic our public servants have become when they can agree on fixing web sites but don't have the courage to work together--across the aisle--to deal with the "monster in the room" known as entitlement programs. The only thing we're entitled to in this country should be opportunity, freedom and education. The rest should be up to the individual and their neighbors...

If you know anything about Blue Grass music (true Americana) you may have some appreciation about the fiddlin' foresters performance. If you had any idea about blue grass music you would be supporting it and try to find them a new web page. I hope they find another way to publish their music!

Stupid and unnecessary? How do we determine which sites to close? The fiddling forest web site is likely to boost employee moral, and team cohesiveness. Folks (the public) that like that sort of music may wind up being exposed to the services these folks provide, so it's good PR. The cost of this website should be miniscule. Some folks would argue that the national parks, and US Forest Service are "stupid and unnecessary".

The moster in the room has been there for decades....... (http://www.nader.org/index.php?/archives/2020-Commission-on-Entitlement-and-Tax-Reform.html) Suddenly it's all that matters? Why don't you just say it: We need more opportunity and freedom (from regulation) for corporations the biggest benefiters of government entitlement.

I am sorry, but this is part of our American Heritage that came out of these tradionally rural areas such as the Blue Ridge and Smoky Mountains. As a lover of this heritage, ethnicity, and the music, I feel that the loss of this site is a crying shame! It makes me wonder if this would be on the chopping block if it related to the President's heritage?

Dave and Dave - How right you both are!

I think this is a great idea. Like my own budget, I need to shave money from large areas and in small ways too. It all adds up. So many people talk about how they do not want big Government. This is a good example of it if you are not watching the small things, they turn into big things - waste. Love the idea of the Fiddlin' Foresters, but it would be more cost effective (taxpayers money) to have them as a page(s) on the U.S. Forest Service instead.

At least this site makes someone happy. How about Washington go after the large amount of programs supporting people doing nothing? Leave alone the people who are producing something. I think stupid is standing in line at the grocery behind someone arguing the 35 cent plastic decoration on the 50 serving birthday cake is covered by food stamps also. Why is this site not covered under the endowment for the arts? Bet the clowns in Washington would covered it if the forest was covered in urine!

The forest service has fought many fires here in the southwest this year. If this adds to their moral I would be willing to donate to it. Be it in taxes or privately. It is a miserable job and they do it well. By the way, how much has the "Scumbag-in-cheif" spent on Rappers to entertain in the white house this year?

lesee here....cost of domain: $2 per year (probably already prepaid for the next ten years - cost savings = $0.....forest employees making occasional updates to the website, who will now do something else to fill in their time - cost savings: $0.....when are these guys going to start addressing the real issues?

I too like American blue grass and love this country and all of its history and culture, but there's a place for this type of content and it isn't the Forest Service web site. Creative minds can find a nice spot for it and be able to crossover to public forests and parks.

To Dave and Dave, When the time comes and you are elderly, disabled, or both, please remember not to take anything from Social Security or Medicare. Then you can have the opportunity and freedom to die homeless in a gutter somewhere. Your lack of compassion for those who cannot help themselves is sickening.

Not talking about something someone has paid for. Also not talking about helpless. Talking about parasitic human garbage. The type of people you are enabling. Low expectations of a person or race is the worst kind of bigotry.

The .gov top level domain isn't just used by the federal government. I wonder if they are planning on pulling the plug on the local government sites that are also .gov? The local government I work for uses a .gov domain, and there are no federal dollars being used in maintaining the site.

These Fiddlin Foresters can save there music and add more by uploading it here. http://www.archive.org/ I certainly hope they do.

It's a step. I'm all for good music, team cohesiveness, moral, etc.; it's a great thing. But as a public employee myself, and one that is for all intents and purposes handicapped but still working full time because I have to... This is a step. Sure it's small, but it gets the general "don't touch my stuff" private sector idiots used to the government making changes... I see people everyday going to doctors that just hand them pills and signatures, no real help or diagnosis, taking from the general funds set up to support those of us that have done our time in the workforce. In my department, we have a band too. They play together at all sorts of events. Do they have their own website? No. How are they advertised? By word of mouth. Do they rehearse or perform on Gov Time? No. There is no reason why these Fiddlers have to have a website, etc., paid for by the Government. If they are performing outside of work and selling music, then that should help pay for a private website. Period. Stupid, senseless spending is what got us in this position. Ever watch the movie, "Dave"? Cutting stupid crap is a necessary first step, then the Government has a leg to stand on when they start cutting and fighting other stuff. "We've cut all the crap, now let's fight the fight's over the big stuff." General public can't use the argument that they need to cut wasteful spending instead of attacking those on programs. As a Gov worker, I get hit twice. I pay taxes, work 40 hours a day, everything the normal private sector does, then I have to go to work and pay for my own healthcare (which is crap), insurance, deal with crappy work conditions and THEN I get blamed for all the woes in the world. Back off and let them get rid of the crap....at least they are actually doing something.

The word you folks are looking for is morale, not moral.

Given the chance to rant - guess I got carried away. Thanks.

Sorry about the misspelling. Got carried away.

Leaving aside the trash talk about entitlement programs (god forbid one of these people ends up getting injured and having to live on Disability, let's hear how much noise they make then) this is certainly a ridiculous and embarassing effort at cost-cutting. Owning a URL costs about $10/year; the Feds host the site themselves at little cost, and they use freeware content management systems (Drupal) to maintain them. If the site is not appropriate to the U.S. Forestry Service site then transfer it to the Smithsonian. Getting rid of it is shortsighted and actually offensive. In fact the government should do everything to support bluegrass music, which is a part of our heritage and an alternative to the commercialized Nashville establishment.

Just an observation, but this should have been done in the first 100 days of the Obama Presidency. He must think we're stupid if he really thinks shutting down websites is meaningful deficit reduction. If he was an effective leader in any way, then this woul dbe done long ago, and entitlement funding, as well as real, structural reduction in the size of the federal government, would be the conversation today. In fact, though, what we have is a 20% larger government. Budget issues that could have been fixed with a "financial scalpel" 2 years ago now require a "financial chainsaw". Without a real example of leadership and real spending reductions (and a balanced budget), we are indeed heading for a real, and painful financial crisis.

An observation....the "general public" you deride in your e-mail rant pay your salary. You don't like that arrangement, then get a job in the private sector. Government is too large and too intrusive, and one only needs to point to the size of the ObamaCare legislative document, the amount, scope, and vrbiage of the President's Executive Orders, and the size and complexity of the US Federal Income Tax Code to see that. I have asked my Congressman to support a balanced budget amanedment (which he supports), a simplified federal tax code, and reduction of 30% of the number of federal employees.

I saw a shopper ahead of me in line buying food with WIC and talking on her iPhone, a nicer phone that I have, mind you. Somehow homeless in a gutter rings hollow.

Nothing more than a dog and pony show for the masses. No real reform is taking place here.

I enjoyed the music video.

Typical comments...you complain when cuts aren't being made, you complain went cuts are being made that it's not enough without looking at the big picture. Worthless and stupid are these kinds of comments.

Apparent you aren't looking at the real costs. Internal government IT adminstration costs are much more than what a general internet consumer may see as costs. Owning a URL costs $35/year. The hosting of the site costs a certain amount per MB that includes the cost of the storage space and the maintenance of the server. Then there are the manhours paid to maintain the site. It does add up when you consider all of the real costs involved.

Boy, a lot of public sector workers are on here during the 9-5 workday to complain how rough they have it, and how we should just fund everything that anyone thinks of. Out. Of. Touch.

I am curious just how many studies they had to do, to determine the websites were unnecessary??? I bet it cost taxpayers 1000x mores than those "unnecessary" websites would in 10 years... Why do they always have to appoint a panel to investigate such trivial things, which ends up taking years and costing millions...Or even more...Does anyone remember when a few short years ago, it was only a few million dollar deficit.... I believe it was right before Huricane Katrina...The government estimates it cost somewhere around 110 Billion Dollars to repair the damage... Lets do the math here ~ it cost $110,000,000,000 to rebuild and the population of the city was thought to be 1.3 million people at the time of the Huricane... Well that is over $82,500 for every man, woman and child in the city...And the actual claims for aide by people where only 750,000 so it is unlikely that 1.3 million people where actually displaced by the storm...That puts the number over 140,000 for each of the people receiving aide... But that was then and billions have been replaced by trillions...I think maybe more than just websites need to be discontinued... Thats just my opinion...

Except in the case of .gov sites, they don't follow the same domain costs or registering process as .com, .org or what nots do. Essentially, the US gov Owns .gov outright. They don't have to 'register'. they just add or create as they see fit, on the fly. Example: California owns ca.gov. California wants to create a new site, called blah.ca.gov. As Obama was only referring to top level sites (i.e. ca.gov, ms.gov, or fbi.gov), and ca.gov has a legit reason to exist, it's safe. Now the subsites under that though... well, that's CA's problem. They delegated control of ca.gov to california (I believe). So there was always a recuring cost in terms of manpower, resources and what nots to support domains of any kind. It just in the gov's case, they have the option of not paying ahead for the sites. Which means they can be shut down just as fast too.

free web site... www.wordpress.com follow the directions, have fun... great music. keep it up.

I own several URL's and it does not cost $35/yr. Storage is cheap. Maintenance is not always cheap but who said these agencies were able to add staff or hire consultants to maintain them? I doubt that very much. And even if I were wrong about all of these points, this doesn't amount to a hill of beans. The amount wasted on a single poorly justified or badly conceived military project can be on the order of $100's of billions (actually the NY Times just did an article documenting several such projects) and here we are talking about peanuts. I am not for wasting money of any sort and I don't doubt that there are truly wasteful and useless Federal web sites, but the one used as an example in this article is culturally valuable in its own right. Like I said, if it doesn't make sense on the Forestry site then move it to the Smithsonian. Just getting rid of it is empty political handwaving without true economic impact.

Good job Mr. President, you just saved Medicare! This level of stupidity is simply beyond my comprehension.

You're an idiot.

Puzzling how an idea is a "bad" idea as long as it comes from the government. If it was anybody's personal budget, it would be a great idea to save a few dollars here and there. But this is a government "bad idea"... I would suggest that anyone who has better ideas to save money -short of those who want to downsize the government even further and yet expect to get the same government services at the same level they received before (talk about a sense of entitlement...) -bring them to the table, or shut up! This constant anti-government rant does not get us anywhere and all it does is alienate. It is no wonder that public service in this country has become a "last option" employment for anyone. Who would want to serve while being vilified to this extent - usually because of the political stupidity that seems to reign? The biggest problem we face in this country is the inordinate amount of "ideas" and the sense of entitlement that everyone seems to get when they speak their mind. Freedom of expression was never intended to denigrate other people's ideas. Your rights end where other people's begin. Remember that!

No one said the band had to disband. All that is being said is that the federal government is no longer going to pay for this web site. If the foresters want to foot the bill and get a .com address, then so be it. Isn't that the same thing the republicans have said to government workers and health care?

How much will this save? No, really, just the facts... how much? Wait-- does that account for the manpower cost associated for sorting them out, evaluating them and time spent deciding whether or not to shut each one of them down at our normal governmental decision making pace? What's the VP's bill rate from managing this project? Palin could come up with better ideas for how the Vice President of the United States should spend his/her time (and I mean Trig). How long until the Website Closure Committee is fully formed and dysfunctional? Why am I even talking about this? This isn't even worth my time... whatever.

If the administration doesn't do anything some of you would still complain that he isn't doing enough - so your political rants are warrantless here, you'd never be happy with anything they do. On the issue of domains: it costs time, energy, people power, and hardware to maintain domains. The DotGov.gov site has a hotline that needs to be maintained, they make $125 from non-Fed sites, they don't really get that benefit here from an Internal agency. Let's be honest, how many people were visiting this site? Go to Alexa.com: http://www.alexa.com/search?q=www.fiddlinforesters.gov&r=home_home&p=bigtop It could only find four links to it, was raked 23 millionth, and that was 6 months ago. Go to Google, http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=link:fiddlinforesters.gov&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8 Again, a handful of links. This isn't about Bluegrass or nonsense remarks about where they should cut, it's about MAKING a cut, that they are looking under EVERY stone to save cash - the way YOU and I would.

Show me the money! How much will this save when you account for the time spent on sorting them out and shutting them down? This isn't a political statement or question, it's a financial one. I very much suspect that it will cost the taxpayers a lot less to leave these sites up than to have the VP and a lot of highly paid people sort through them and decide which ones to shut down. Maybe I'm wrong in assuming that the VP would be doing something with a higher ROI with his time if he wasn't trolling bad websites-- I don't know. Maybe I'm just completely totally wrong-- ok, just show me some meaningful numbers that suggest as much.

I can tell that you have not been spending much time in public school classrooms lately. Education is a privelage -- not a right. If people are 'entitled' to an education then behavior deteriorates badly since so many do not want to be there. That wrecks the program for the ones who actually want an education.

The goal of government and the web sites used should be to make processes more automated, efficient and provide services to it's residents. Unlike ten years ago, most people now know how to use a computer and have access to one. For example there should be few reasons why anyone should need to go to a Government facility to fill out paper work, this should all be automated. It will provide a convenience to the tax payers as well as save money on paper pushing.

If the Federal Government and its officers truly understood, protected and promoted the CONSTITUTION; then there would only be the need for ONE website where anyone could access the information they need because the STATES would be in charge of their perspective jurisdictions. The Federal Government is too BIG. The AMERICAN tax payer is BROKE!