"You'll pay for those forecasts!"

One would think that weather forecasting is a common good that would most easily be coordinated through the federal government, but apparently Sen. Rick Santorum doesn’t think so. He has introduced a bill designed to make sure the National Weather Service can’t publicly share information that would be in competition with private companies such as AccuWeather and The Weather Channel.

While I can’t help but admit the fact that Senator Santorum is at least philosophically consistent on this bill, I would still have to disagree with the bill itself. If the NWS hasn’t stopped anyone from starting a private weather forecasting company, then why would we restrict the information from the people who paid for it: You and me. (Well, ignoring the fact that our lower taxes and increased expenditures have led to a budget deficit, which means that quite a bit of our government’s funding is coming from China buying Treasury bonds.)

Link courtesy of Metafilter