Quote:Nancy Pelosi was hiring someone to redo the recovery.gov website. Three people were bidding: a guy from New York, a guy from California, and a lobbyist from Washington DC.

Pelosi asked the guy from New York for his bid. He made some phone calls, did some math on a calculator, and said "I can do this website for one million dollars".

Pelosi next asked the guy from California. Being from Silicon Valley, he called some of his friends that had done similar websites. He turned to Pelosi and said "I can do this website for you for two million dollars".

Pelosi then asked the last person, the lobbyist from DC. Without blinking an eye, the lobbyist answered: "Eighteen Million Dollars".

Pelosi was taken aback. She looked at the lobbyist and asked, "I'm curious, how do you expect to get this project by asking for such a large amount of money?"


The Lobbyist answered with a smile, "Eight million for you, eight million for me, and we hire the guy from California."