He calmly gazed down at the document, which contained authorization for water projects across the nation. The bill, H.R. 1495, the “Water Resources Development Act of 2007” was crammed full of excessive spending. It had easily passed the House and the Senate because everyone received some pork.

“It’s getting close to the holiday season, but these ‘gifts’ are excessive,” he told his staff. “I just don’t understand their math.”

He commented, “They took a bill in the House of Representatives that was $15 billion and negotiated the differences with the U.S Senate bill that was $14 billion. Then, they passed a bill that was $23 billion.”

He proudly stated, “As a graduate of Yale University, this fuzzy math just does not add up. At Yale, we’d take the $14 billion and the $15 billion and split the difference. If my trusty calculator is correct, a compromise would have been…$14.5 billion.”

So the President of the United States of America, George W. Bush, vetoed the Water Resources Development Act of 2007.

Members of Congress across the fruited plain were struck with overwhelming shock at the President’s veto. The shame! The travesty! One Stanford graduate serving in the U.S. Senate pulled out his pocket dictionary/thesaurus and proclaimed the President’s veto was “downright dumb.” Another said President Bush is “out of touch with the priorities of rural America.” Still another said the veto was “shortsighted.”

Of course, the veto will be overridden by the House and the Senate because everyone gets a little pork in this bill…if it’s funded through the Appropriations Committees down the road. But that’s another story for another day.