Workers throughout the government will pay a price, too, and it will continue long after the news releases stop.

One federal employee probably spoke for many in a note posted to our Washington Post story that broke news about the report:

“Unfortunately for those of us in agencies where a. we don’t have money for conferences to begin with, and b. we aren’t even allowed funds to buy coffee when we have on site meetings, the result of the GSA excesses will be increased scrutiny of all travel and training requests. So all of us, honest thrifty agencies included, will have to jump through more hoops and spend more time justifying everything we do.

“Thanks for making life harder for the rest of us govvies, GSA!”…

Don’t be surprised if Democrats go back beyond the 2010 conference in holding the agency accountable. On Friday, Politico reported that the big jump in GSA conference spending came under the Bush administration. The cost of similar GSA conferences rocketed from $93,000 in 2004 to $323,855 in 2006, a 248 percent increase.