Brian Balfour, a policy analyst at North Carolina’s John W. Pope Civitas Institute, researched the Federal Stimulus funds going into the North Carolina government and university sectors. With questionable projects already in motion, such as $147,694 going toward reducing hot flashes during yoga and $300,000 funding the construction of a Town Hall, nothing is quite as unique as funding monkeys to take cocaine and see what happens for $71,623.
According to Recovery.org, Wake Forest University is researching the effects of cocaine use and abstinence on the dopamine, a neurotransmitter, and glutamate systems. The Medical School is testing the results from giving monkeys the drug by measuring the regulation mechanisms related to the systems. Researchers hope it will help improve treatment for cocaine addicts.
The stimulus was advertised as preventing economic catastrophe and guaranteeing job security when Americans were worried about their futures and their children’s lives. A year later, our nation’s future looks more uncertain with more pork crowding out the real job creator: free-market capitalism. I have to wonder who’s under the influence, Keynesian politicians or the monkeys. Smoke if you got ‘em.