Stimulating Dead People: It's Funny, but it Smells

More reports coming in that dead people are receiving the $250 Social Security stimulus checks.

Antoniette Santopadre of Valley Stream was expecting a $250 stimulus check. But when her son finally opened it, they saw that the check was made out to her father, Romolo Romonini, who died in Italy 34 years ago. He'd been a U.S. citizen when he left for Italy in 1933, but only returned to the United States for a seven-month visit in 1969.

Of course it's funny, in the glorification of incompetence sort of way that Americans are accustomed to laughing at their federal government, but there's also something this time that doesn't seem quite right.

What database did the Social Security system link into in order to send out these checks? This is their excuse:

The Social Security Administration, which sent out 52 million checks, says that some of those checks mistakenly went to dead people because the agency had no record of their death. That amounts to between 8,000 and 10,000 checks for millions of dollars.

That's up to $2.5 million, to be specific. Doesn't it also raise the question, why this time? Why isn't the Social Security administration sending out regular checks to these same dead people if they have no record of their death?

It doesn't wash. The mystery deepens:

The feds blame a rushed schedule, because all the checks have to be cut by June. The strange thing is, some of the checks were made out to people -- like Romonini -- who were never even part of the Social Security system.

Never a part of the Social Security system?

Again, I must ask, what freakin' database is being tapped here? What extra names were pooled into the system, and are there more checks going to places we don't know about ... for a reason?

Someone with investigative powers ought to be asking the same questions and demanding some answers.