The end of the calendar year is typically a time for reflection as we prepare to move into the new year. For some of the more fiscally responsible members of Congress, that means looking back on all the ways government has wasted our money, in hopes that shedding some light on these examples will prevent more waste and abuse in the future.

This month, Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., and Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., issued reports filled with examples of government waste. Now comes Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, a Republican presidential candidate, who details 33 examples of waste totaling more than $1 billion in his Festivus-themed “Airing of Grievances” report.

Among the items are the $250,000 the State Department spent to send 24 Pakistani students to Space Camp and Dollywood, the $350,000 National Science Foundation grant to study athletes’ perceptions when they are in “the zone” and the $104 million in housing subsidies the Department of Housing and Urban Development doled out to more than 25,000 households whose incomes exceed eligibility limits – some making six-figures – while nearly 600,000 people remain on waiting lists for housing.

The State Department threw taxpayers a wicked googly when it spent $850,000 over two years to subsidize a professional cricket tournament in Afghanistan and offer job training in sports broadcasting in production, despite the fact that just 0.4 percent of the Afghan population owns a television.

The Agriculture Department spent $72.5 million to subsidize “specialty” crops, which actually make up most of what we eat and include more than 300 fruits, vegetables and nuts, as well as cut flowers, nursery crops and even sod and live Christmas trees. (“[A]ccording to USDA, just about anything is ‘special,’” the report notes.) Yet, even this is peanuts compared to the $370 million the USDA spent on crop insurance payouts intended for extreme weather events that went to farmers who planted crops in wetlands that regularly fill up with water at certain times of the year.

Unfortunately, if past congressional inaction and indifference are any indication, it will take some serious Feats of Strength to convince a majority in Congress and the president to put an end to such wasteful spending.