Earmarks versus Honesty and Integrity
Posted: Tuesday, March 03, 2009
by Joel Hirschhorn
http://www.delusionaldemocracy.com
What in the world is protecting President Obama from being publicly condemned so thoroughly that shame causes him to do what he said he would do: not sign pork-laden bills loaded by both Democrats and Republicans in Congress with earmarks?
Could there be a better time than the current economic meltdown and skyrocketing debt-based federal spending to put a stop to ludicrous, wasteful spending?
The facts are crystal clear. The House has already passed a $410 billion spending bill for the current fiscal year; it is loaded with nearly 9,000 earmarks costing $7.7 billion, up 3.4 percent from last year according to Taxpayers for Common Sense. It is likely to also pass the Senate. Democrats said 40 percent of the spending on earmarks went to projects requested by Republicans. Nice, all that means is we have bipartisan corruption.
People need to understand that virtually all earmarks result from lobbying of members by those who want money. Members of Congress give them money because they expect to get something in return, including support for their campaigns. For example, Representative Anthony Weiner, Democrat, New York , received more than $160,000 in campaign contributions from for the Sephardic Addiction and Family Education (SAFE) Foundation in Brooklyn , New York , which has an earmark from him for $238,000. He was also sole sponsor on a $300,000 earmark for Brooklyn 's Ohel Children's Home and Family Services, whose board members and employees have also given him money; its director has personally given $6,240.
Worse yet, all kinds of groups, including colleges and local governments, pay professional lobbyists hefty fees to get their pet projects funded. For example, the legislation includes 14 earmarks requested by lawmakers for projects sought by PMA Group, a lobbying company at the center of a federal corruption investigation.
During the campaign this is what candidate Obama said: "We need earmark reform. And when I'm president, I will go line by line to make sure we're not spending money unwisely." He has talked repeatedly about fiscal responsibility and real change in politics. Talk is cheap. This spending bill is not.
Several of Obama's top people have already signaled that President Obama will not keep his word. His budget director Peter R. Orszag said: "This is last year's business. We want to just move on. Let's get this bill done, get it into law and move forward." His chief of staff Rahm Emanuel said the president was not happy about the large number of earmarks in the bill but would sign it. "What the American people want to know is, do these individual Congressional earmarks meet a worthy public objective, or are they just an individual desire of a member of Congress?" Mr. Emanuel said. Well, that means citizens should pay attention to the earmarks. To help you, consider these illustrative pieces of pork in the legislation:
$1 million to control Mormon crickets in Utah ,
$162,000 to control rodents in Hawaii ,
$1.7 million for a honey bee laboratory in Weslaco , Texas.
$346,000 for research on apple fire blight in Michigan and New York ,
$1.5 million for work on grapes and grape products, including wine
$1.8 million to conduct research in Iowa on "swine odor and manure management,"
$173,000 for research on asparagus production in Washington ,
$206,000 for wool research in Montana , Texas and Wyoming ,
$209,000 for efforts to improve blueberry production in Georgia ,
$208,000 to control a weed known as cogongrass in Mississippi ,
$1.2 million to control cormorants in Michigan , Mississippi , New York and Vermont ,
$950,000 for the Western Kentucky University bikeway project,
$427,000 for the Gunpowder Creek trail in Boone County , Kentucky ,
$1.6 million for the Forage Animal Production Research Laboratory in Lexington , Kentucky ,
$238,000 for the Alaska PTA.
$819, 000 for catfish genetics research in Alabama
$190,000 for the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody , Wyoming ,
$400,000 for copper wire theft prevention efforts,
$47,500 to remodel and expand a playground in Ottawa , Illinois ,
$285,000 for the Discovery Center of Idaho in Boise
$951,500 for a "sustainable Las Vegas ,"
$2 million for promotion of astronomy in Hawaii ,
$1.7 million for pig odor research in Iowa ,
$6.6 million for termite research in New Orleans ,
$238,000 for the Polynesian Voyaging Society in Hawaii ,
$2.1 million for the Center for Grape Genetics in New York ,
$333,000 for a school sidewalk in Franklin , Texas ,
$95,000 for r ailroad grade crossing safety improvement, Huntington , Long Island ,
$237,500 for Northport Veterans Community Center , Long Island
$143,000 for an online encyclopedia in Nevada ,
$713,625 for Woody Biomass in New York ,
$24,000 for abstinence,
$300,000 for Montana World Trade Center ,
$950,000 for Myrtle Beach International Trade and Convention Center,
$200,000 for Oil Region Alliance.
$190,000 for Buffalo Bill Historical Center, Cody , Wyoming ,
$143,000 for Las Vegas Natural History Museum , Las Vegas , Nevada ,
$381,000 for Jazz at Lincoln Center , New York , New York , $200,000 for a tattoo removal program in Los Angeles .
To add insult to injury, the bill even includes earmarks requested by some lawmakers who have left Congress, like Senator Pete V. Domenici, Republican, New Mexico , and Representative William J. Jefferson, Democrat, Louisiana. Even more obnoxious, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and Labor Secretary Hilda Solis have earmarks in this omnibus bill from last year. Vice President Biden got $750,000 for the University of Delaware satellite station. Chief of staff Rahm Emanuel got $900,000 for the Chicago Planetarium, $95,000 for "educational expenses" at the Kohl Children's Museum in Glenview , Ill. ; and $950,000 for "street rehabilitation" in the village of Franklin Park , Ill. , just several of his 16 projects worth $8.5 million.
To his credit, long time anti-earmark advocate Representative Jeff Flake, Republican, Arizona , said it was unseemly for Congress to finance so many pet projects at a time when "the Justice Department is investigating the connection between earmarks and campaign contributions." Obviously, he is a very lonely dissident.
In the Senate, Senator John McCain tried to stop the legislation but failed. He said: "So here we are. Here we are promising the American people hope and change. And what do we get? Business as usual. Last year's business? The president will sign this appropriations bill into law. It's the president's business. So what are we doing here? Not only business as usual; but an outrageous insult to the American people. .. This practice has corrupted people, that's why we have former members in jail, that's why the American people are angry at the way we do business. When do we turn off the spigots? Haven't we learned anything? Bills like this jeopardize our future." These sentiments surely match what most Americans feel.
Why wouldn't President Obama veto the bill and proudly tell the American public exactly why he is doing that: He wants to live up to what he promised when he was campaigning. He wants Congress to take out all the earmarks and send the cleaned bill back to him. The only logical answer is that he still believes in pay to play and that this is the price he is willing to pay to get Congress to give him what he wants. Billions of unnecessary and wasted dollars that the nation surely cannot afford now is not what most of us have been waiting for. We need a real reformer.
Senator Jim DeMint, Republican, South Carolina , commented "President Obama has a chance to take one of the biggest steps toward real earmark reform in years."
When President Obama signs rather than vetoes this bill where will the public outrage be expressed? On many websites, but probably very little will surface among the cable pundits and mainstream media darlings. This will tell me that President Obama can get away with the most audacious lack of honesty and integrity. Which also says something terribly shameful about the electorate.
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Top-level comments on this article: (4 total)Joel, I sincerely appreciate your well thought out writings. However, I will use your point in the article "we're not spending money unwisely." President Obama. Now that is a relative statement, open ended and subjective. Who says it is unwise? The rule of Selective Application. No more Paul Harvey to ride heard on them and unfortunately it doesn't matter why they said during a campaign. Americans expect that.
Important update:According to Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonprofit group that tracks Congressional spending, there are in the spending bill at least 9,286 earmarks worth $12.8 billion, including projects requested by the Bush administration.
After 8 years with a Republican government, I would think that Obama should have more than 5 weeks to restore a failed economy. Would any administration, Republican or Democratic, be able to go line by line and truly investigate each and every earmark in 5 weeks? I don't think so. The election is over and Obama won it by a large margin. Let's give him our support now to get this economy moving again. Obama promised accountability and if that doesn't happen after a year in office, and if we don't see some movement in hiring and spending as a result of his efforts, then I'll worry. Right now, we need a quick response to the economy. I think the fine tuning and accountability will follow. If it doesn't, he'll be out of office in 4 years.
Joel do we have 4 years? I suspect 4 months is more in order and yes he had everything to do with this mess.
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