June 20, 2007 by Kevin E. Dayhoff
My Tentacle column is up and it involves an issue that crosses party lines and simply must be addressed – pork, earmarks, Congressional discretionary spending…
I have written about this mess before, see: 20060503 Congressional Pork: The Other Red Meat by Kevin Dayhoff
Please also note that since this column was filed early Tuesday morning, June 19th, 2007, Congressman Roscoe Bartlett (R – 6 Dist., MD) has released information on all his earmarks – please see: 20070619 Congressman Bartlett releases his earmarks
Earmarks: A Bridge to Bankruptcy
June 20, 2007 by Kevin E. Dayhoff
After months of bitter fighting, the surge on "earmarks," our own homegrown version of economic terrorism, continues to meet stiff resistance.
The Great Porkbusters War has now raged in a "Twilight Zone" for over 18 months with no resolution in sight. The initial "Porkbusters" grassroots effort was launched in September 2005 by conservative political commentator Glenn Reynolds as an effort "to cut 'pork barrel' spending by the
Sen. Tom Coburn (R.,OK,) whom political commentator Mark Tapscott has credited with spearheading the war on earmarks, quickly saw an opportunity to strike a major blow against earmarks and proposed the "Coburn Amendment" to a broad, sweeping appropriations bill, which had been introduced in June of that year.
The Coburn Amendment attempted to remove money from the bill. It specifically addressed the $220 million so-called "Bridge to Nowhere" in
By now the Democrats had discovered the issue as politically expedient and in March 2006, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D., CA) held a press conference in which she railed against earmarks.
It was political theatre at its best…
Read the rest of the column here: Earmarks: A Bridge to Bankruptcy
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