Best muffin evah!!! (Or it had better be for that price)

Vince524 · Sep 22, 2011

http://news.yahoo.com/16-muffins-8-coffee-served-justice-audit-023623142.html

As the U.S. government grapples to find ways to trim the bloated federal deficit, a new report suggests officials might start with cutting out $16 muffins and $10 cookies.

"We found the Department (of Justice) spent $16 on each of the 250 muffins served at an August 2009 legal conference in Washington," said a DOJ Office of Inspector General report released on Tuesday.

The DOJ spent $121 million on conferences in fiscal 2008 and 2009, which exceeded its own spending limits and appeared to be extravagant and wasteful, according to the report that examined 10 conferences held during that period.

The review turned up the expensive muffins, which came from the Capital Hilton Hotel just blocks from the White House, as well as cookies and brownies that cost almost $10 each.

What the hell were in those muffins!!!!

Don · Sep 22, 2011

Hey, our masters work hard in our defense. They deserve a little special treatment for sacrificing their careers to the common good. Sixteen-dollar muffins and ten-dollar cookies are way cheaper than five hundred-dollar hookers, after all.

And $121 million? That's chump change. That's not even $.30 from every man, woman, and child in the US. Is that all you think justice is worth?

After all, if it wasn't for FedGov, justice would probably mean the states running wild, killing people for crimes they didn't commit. The states would probably even be locking up minorities left and right for silly things like smoking weeds, and dog knows how they'd be treating gay people. Probably wouldn't even let them marry.

:sarcasm

crunchyblanket · Sep 22, 2011

For that price, I'd expect the muffins to be hand-crafted by fairy princesses and delivered via diamond-encrusted pony rockets.

Vince524 · Sep 22, 2011

You do realize Don, these are not the kind of Muffins you would bake. The ones that make you hungrier afterwards!!

Vince524 · Sep 22, 2011

crunchyblanket said:
For that price, I'd expect the muffins to be hand-crafted by fairy princesses and delivered via diamond-encrusted pony rockets.

Those are $22.53 muffins. More, if you want those diamonds to shine.

Alessandra Kelley · Sep 22, 2011

The irony here is they had only snacks at that conference -- muffins, cookies, and brownies -- in order to save money, rather than serving proper lunches.

crunchyblanket · Sep 22, 2011

Vince524 said:
Those are $22.53 muffins. More, if you want those diamonds to shine.

Fine. Some lesser gem, then. But the fairy princesses are non-negotiable.

regdog · Sep 22, 2011

Apparently the Justice Department has never heard that Costco and BJ's have bake shops

bettielee · Sep 22, 2011

crunchyblanket said:
For that price, I'd expect the muffins to be hand-crafted by fairy princesses and delivered via diamond-encrusted pony rockets.

My muffins are a lot cheaper than that...

Gregg · Sep 22, 2011

Might actually be cheap when you think that the Justice Department probably gave the Chef a 2250 page recipe to make the muffins.
Then there's the testing, weighing, analyzing and publishing of the ingredients, calories, and health warnings.

Vince524 · Sep 22, 2011

bettielee said:
My muffins are a lot cheaper than that...

Michael Wolfe · Sep 22, 2011

Don said:
Sixteen-dollar muffins and ten-dollar cookies are way cheaper than five hundred-dollar hookers, after all.

Fine. Give them a five hundred dollar hooker, and have them all share. That's gotta be cheaper than everyone getting their own muffins and cookies, right?

crunchyblanket · Sep 23, 2011

bettielee said:
My muffins are a lot cheaper than that...

I'll take a dozen.

ColoradoGuy · Sep 23, 2011

Probably just another tempest in a teapot.

(Although it is odd to find Mother Jones defending the DOJ.)

Vince524 · Sep 23, 2011

Michael Wolfe said:
Fine. Give them a five hundred dollar hooker, and have them all share. That's gotta be cheaper than everyone getting their own muffins and cookies, right?

So instead of expensive muffins & cookies, you get crabs & cooties?

Opty · Sep 23, 2011

In light of the Shweddy Balls thread, the story in the OP made me think that perhaps they're so expensive because they're selling Betty White's "Dusty Muffin."

http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/npr/1226057/

Dommo · Sep 24, 2011

http://www.justice.gov/oig/reports/plus/a1143.pdf

Read pages 32 and 33.

The whole thing was bullshit. It was a part of the price of a continental breakfast. It doesn't mean it wasn't hella expensive, but the reality of a conference (having helped organize one myself), is that you're basically paying what the venue wants you to pay for food, because most won't allow outside caterers. In our case, the hotel charged basically exactly what our per diem rate was per person for a continental breakfast (we were on our own for lunch, but because the conference started early, we opted for setting up breakfast in the hotel).

What this means is that the hotel looks in the public per diem guide for a given city (it's the guide that sets the food/incidental budget for gov employees), and priced out the breakfast food based on that. In my experience in this particular location the food budget for per diem at breakfast was $9, and that's what the hotel charged per person.

I'm pissed about government waste as much as the next guy, but all I can see this leading to, are food budgets that can't cover the cost of the location, and having to fight with our travel people over buying a 99 cent breakfast burrito.

nighttimer · Sep 25, 2011

The rush to judgment around these parts is getting kind of ridiculous.

Those alleged $16 muffins everyone is up in arms about? Turns out they came with fruit and drinks.

Pete Yost of the Associated Press reports that Hilton Worldwide, which manages the Capital Hilton where the 2009 legal conference mentioned in the Justice Department's Inspector General report took place, says the breakfast "included fresh fruit, coffee, juice, muffins, tax and gratuity, for an inclusive price of $16 per person."

"Dining receipts are often abbreviated and do not reflect the full pre-contracted menu and service provided, as is the case with recent media reports of breakfast items approved for some government meetings," Hilton's statement said.

http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsme...drinks_came_with_those_16_muffins.php?ref=fpb

Don · Sep 25, 2011

Yeah, $16 a head for a cold continental breakfast that doesn't even include cereal or milk, or donuts for the sugar freaks, is a real deal. I guess they get such a great price because they're buying in bulk.

So it's actually $16, on average, for a large group where most will have something to drink and a few who don't mind looking unprepared will snag a muffin and discretely wolf it down while the opening speaker settles in.

That's a real bargain... for somebody.

Dommo said:
What this means is that the hotel looks in the public per diem guide for a given city (it's the guide that sets the food/incidental budget for gov employees), and priced out the breakfast food based on that.

In other words, stick it to the taxpayers, they'll never know.

Gee, maybe they could either a) charge a reasonable price for muffins and coffee, or b) provide a reasonable $16 a head breakfast.

nighttimer · Sep 25, 2011

Don said:
Yeah, $16 a head for a cold continental breakfast that doesn't even include cereal or milk, or donuts for the sugar freaks, is a real deal. I guess they get such a great price because they're buying in bulk.

So it's actually $16, on average, for a large group where most will have something to drink and a few who don't mind looking unprepared will snag a muffin and discretely wolf it down while the opening speaker settles in.

That's a real bargain... for somebody.

In other words, stick it to the taxpayers, they'll never know.

Gee, maybe they could either a) charge a reasonable price for muffins and coffee, or b) provide a reasonable $16 a head breakfast.

Guess you haven't had breakfast at any hotels lately. :rolleyes

Perhaps next time instead of a $16 continental breakfast somebody will bring a box of Krispy Kremes, some Pop-Tarts and a couple gallons of milk.

Naturally, while everyone is getting bent over bureaucrats and their food choices, the real pigs feeding at the trough go unnoticed and continue to be fat, dumb and happy.

For far too long the quality of our national security has been judged by the quantity of Pentagon spending and by the size of our armed forces.

The truth is, the more we spent like this, the more we have wasted and the less we actually thought about the meaning of national security. This muscular approach is ill suited for the national security challenges facing the United States in the 21st Century.

Over the past 10 years, the DOD budget increased from $297 billion to $549 billion, not including the Overseas Contingency Operations, which alone stands at $159 billion for FY11. Even if we factor in inflation, in an era of constant budget deficits, this rate of spending is unsustainable.

Out-of-control defense spending is a major cause for the calamitous state of our overall budget. This threatens the peace and prosperity that responsible national security planning is designed to protect. We cannot allow the Pentagon to continue to spend exorbitant amounts of money without thought to overall strategy or long-term interests.

Don · Sep 25, 2011

You can't blame me for the Pentagon, nt. I was all for the exorcism in '67. It would look much better colored orange, floating in the sky. Unfortunately, the evil spirits inside were too powerful for the small group arrayed against them.

Manuel Royal · Sep 25, 2011

Dommo said:
http://www.justice.gov/oig/reports/plus/a1143.pdf

Read pages 32 and 33.

The whole thing was bullshit. It was a part of the price of a continental breakfast. It doesn't mean it wasn't hella expensive, but the reality of a conference (having helped organize one myself), is that you're basically paying what the venue wants you to pay for food, because most won't allow outside caterers. In our case, the hotel charged basically exactly what our per diem rate was per person for a continental breakfast (we were on our own for lunch, but because the conference started early, we opted for setting up breakfast in the hotel).

What this means is that the hotel looks in the public per diem guide for a given city (it's the guide that sets the food/incidental budget for gov employees), and priced out the breakfast food based on that. In my experience in this particular location the food budget for per diem at breakfast was $9, and that's what the hotel charged per person.

I'm pissed about government waste as much as the next guy, but all I can see this leading to, are food budgets that can't cover the cost of the location, and having to fight with our travel people over buying a 99 cent breakfast burrito.

I'll buy that, but how do the hotels get away with it? Do industry conferences get ripped off the same way? (And does that include hotel industry conferences? Maybe they all rip each other off.)

Dommo · Sep 25, 2011

The big difference with the government is that our finances and spending are public record. They just know that we're assigned a fixed allowance for certain types of expenses, and those allowances are public. It's a lot like telling a car dealership exactly how much money you're willing to spend.

Best muffin evah!!! (Or it had better be for that price)

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