Well, you knew that something like this was going to happen.

WASHINGTON—Bipartisan opposition is emerging in the Senate to a plan by House lawmakers to spend $550 million for additional passenger jets for senior government officials.

The resistance to buying eight Gulfstream and Boeing planes comes as members of both chambers of Congress embark on the busiest month of the year for official overseas travel. The plan to upgrade the fleet of government jets, which was included in a broader defense-funding bill, has also sparked criticism from the Pentagon, which has said it doesn’t need half of the new jets.

“The whole thing kind of makes me sick to my stomach,” said Sen. Claire McCaskill (D., Mo.) in an interview Sunday. “It is evidence that some of the cynicism about Washington is well placed—that people get out of touch and they spend money like it’s Monopoly money.”

Several other senators said they share the concerns and will work to oppose the funding for the jets when the legislation is taken up by the Senate in September, including Sens. John McCain (R., Ariz.,) Jack Reed (D., R.I.), Richard Burr (R., N.C.), Christopher Bond (R., Mo.) and John Thune (R., S.D.).

Here’s the positive spin on this development; this is what you want the politicians to do. Bicker about how much money they are spending. It’s an unprecedented development to see this type of fighting going on in Washington, and this is a great position for us as a public to be in. I was actually pretty happy to see Washington squabbling over this money spent.

That said, there comes a time when this is unproductive. With this 500 million dollars are jobs created (unless this money was already spent, which could actually be the case). This whole idea of “deficit spending” is beginning to rub me the wrong way, as well. Look, I’m the last one to want government to spend all of this money, I’d rather see them in rags begging for us to save even pennies of tax dollars at their own personal expense.

However, that said, let’s dispense with the argument that “deficit spending” is anything more than a new word we’ve attached ourselves to in the last 6 or 7 months. You and I (for the most part) are deficit spenders, too. We borrow money even when we have debt. As I’ve said with the “cash for Clunkers” argument in the past, I’m not necessarily against the idea of spending deficit money, if we know it’s going to get us somewhere. We go into deficit spending in our personal lives, with the caveat being that what we buy we’ll get more out of down the road.

What we really need to ask ourselves, is was this a purchase that we stand to benefit from down the road. The article makes it sound as if these will be cheaper to maintain than the older fleet, which I’m not opposed to. If they’re more fuel efficient, and will net us a gain down the road refueling them, I’d take it into consideration.

How does this contrast my views on California, asking to eliminate half of all government positions? California has no plan for the future, they have raised almost any conceivable tax that they can, and want to raise more to support things that at best need overhauls, and at worst are money pits. They are rife with labor unions, demanding to live like kings on the backs of the tax payers, and entire industries are now built on suckling the government teat for more and more.

If this “stimulus” (yes, I’m calling it that) can put people to work, then it’s not inherently bad. If this “stimulus” also saves us some money down the road, not that bad of a decision, either. If it’s just spending for spending sake, I’m not down with that in the slightest. If anything, I’d say to repurpose this money for the clunker program, if it can’t be demonstrated that this is a necessary expense. That said, instead of railing on anything we spend money on, we should be willing to look at the evidence and see if we’re being penny smart and pound foolish.