BOSTON - Mitt Romney’s endorsement on Thursday was good news for Republican presidential front-runner John McCain, who now may have enough delegates to seal up his party’s nomination. But the news had the unintended side effect of overwhelming McCain’s message of the day. A new report by the watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense found that Democratic presidential candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton steered millions of dollars to pet projects in their home states, a common congressional practice known as “earmarking,” while McCain had none.
McCain has sought to curb earmarks for years and on the campaign trail frequently mentions them as a waste of taxpayer dollars. Earmarks are often slipped into gargantuan spending bills at the last minute to avoid scrutiny.
The report found that Clinton, a New York senator, had steered $340 million in earmarks to her home state in last year’s spending bills, while Obama, a senator from Illinois, racked up a relatively frugal $91 million.
McCain famously slammed Clinton last fall for requesting $1 million for a museum to commemorate the Woodstock rock festival when he quipped that “I was tied up at the time,” a reference to his years spent as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.
On Thursday, McCain trained his sights on Obama, criticizing him for keeping secret his earmark requests in past years.
“He says that he believes in transparency in government and yet will not identify the pork barrel projects he sponsored in 2006 and 2005. I think it’s appropriate for the American taxpayer as well as the American people to know,” McCain said at a press conference in South Burlington, Vermont.
It could have been a potent attack against a rival who has styled himself as a good-government reformer.
But the endorsement by Romney, a former Massachusetts governor who dropped out of the race last week, quickly became the top story of the day.
As a longtime crusader against earmarks, McCain is unlikely to let the matter rest. Look for it to bubble up again - on a slower news day.
Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.
-Photo credit: Reuters/Neal Hamburg (Mitt Romney endorses John McCain)
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7 comments so far
Two weeks after declaring “Washington is broken and John McCain is part of the problem”, Mitt secures a backroom deal and performs his greatest flip-flop of all. I guess it’s not terribly surprising, but I wish the GOP brass understood that people are tired of politics as usual, and sickened by this type of insincerity. Romney is the most artificial politician seen in recent years, and he just proved it. I hope his delegates flock to support the ONE authentic Conservative- indeed, the one authentic PERSON- left in the race: Governor Mike Huckabee.
- Posted by BethBeth,
Have you taken your medication?
What flip-flop? What back room deal? What politics as usual? What is an artificial politician, you have a doll like him?
You give Huckabee a bad name.
Put up or shut up. Either you have the evidence or you don’t. I say you don’t. I win.
- Posted by JumialInnuendo will not win it for Huckabee.
Try something real, like facts.
- Posted by NancyOur country is bankrupt!
This article is talking about RIDICULOUS expenditures we have NO MONEY for made by Obama and Clinton to bribe the people of their own states — with the difference being that Clinton earmarked more than 3 times the amount Obama did.
McCain was again calling himself a war hero, but he did make zero earmark expenditures. (Is there a flicker of a redeeming quality in there? Nah.)
- Posted by CarolWhat does it take to wake a sleeping Giant?
So, it goes, we vote into offices those who are to serve our best intrest.
In return of our trust, the elected ones, enjoy the privileges that are not within the reach of those who placed them in such a position.
Their genius, so it goes, created a system, which collects dollars from those who labor, hold ownership or real property, or hold mate4rial value.
Taxation was created in the name of growth, development, health and welfare.
Comfortable, the Giant growls and falls to a slumber.
Knowing that those who he entrusted to serve the people were intact.
All the while, taxation begins to grow beyond the reason of individual calculation.
In his slumber, he hears a loud Thud with a Capital D as in Debt!
Such a thud work the Giant as well as the World.
He questioned? Why have we fallen? And rose up and pointed his finger and spoke!
By those we entrusted the rights, and privileges to which the United States conveys has been breached.
As, well by the people, through neglectful consideration and lack of response,
Financially spent, the economy spiraling downwardly, as Corporate America becomes a World economy.
Outsourcing jobs from the reach of Americans.
Printing currency as desired for distribution without assurances.
Debt strategy; Browing from China and the Middle East to support their spoils.
Ownership as we know it is being lost, as new landlords hold our rich diversity.
While the very core being of the United States of America is at extreme peril.
This is how to wake a slwwping Giant.
Rise up people, consider your voice as one to be heard, by those who we have place trust in.
The to may one day be amongst those standing in line to apply for un employment………..smile.
Rick Brockman
- Posted by Rick BrockmanAwesome job, Rick….
- Posted by CarolEARMARKS MUST BE ELIMINATED!
The term “Earmark” is most comonly used to refer to a provision (line-item) in legislation that directs funds to be spent on specific projects. Members of Congress insert earmarks into bills in order to direct specified amounts of money be given or spent on particular organizations or projects in their home states or districts. This differs from the appropriation of budget money to a particular government agency where the agency head can exercise discretion as to where and how the funds are spent. If the funds aren’t earmarked by members of congress, the agencies are free to spend money on projects they believe are most appropriate to meet their organizational goals and objectives.
Earmarks can more accurately be described as giving away the taxpayers hard earned money by secretly attaching line-items into non-related congressional bills for specific projects or specific recipients in order to get re-elected.
Many of the beneficiaries of these earmarked funds are state or local public agencies, but just as often, the money goes to private entities where the beneficiaries are political supporters of the legislators pushing the earmarks. Earmarks are the principal means by which Members of Congress “bring home the pork” and publishing their earmarks during an election year is a common tactic used to help incumbent members of congress get reelected.
It is not so much that any single earmark is the problem, but rather it’s the entire process. There is no real transparency or accountability in the current system. Members of congress try to re-direct billions of dollars of funding to specific projects within their district without subjecting these projects to debate by their colleagues, or to scrutiny and oversight by the public. The earmarking process invites backroom deals and sometimes unethical, or even corrupt behavior. It has become part of a “pay-to-play” culture where lobbyists, contractors and well-connected individuals give campaign contributions to legislators in return for receiving federal funding via earmarks for their special projects.
While the vital interests of the nation are being ignored by members of both houses of congress regardless of party affiliation, many legislators concentrate their efforts on diverting appropriated agency money to low-priority and sometimes outrageous special interest projects that will generate local publicity and additional campaign contributions.
While the country suffers from an invasion of illegal aliens and cannot seem to find the funds for increased border security, congress earmarks $3.4 million to research the Formosan Subterranean Termite and $10 million to La Raza, a pro-illegal alien amnesty organization. While the country goes deeper and deeper into debt and the dollar seems to lose its value every day, congress earmarks $450,000 for the International Peace Garden in Dunseith, North Dakota and $13.5 million for the International Fund for Ireland, which includes funding for the World Toilet Summit. While the nation’s education system is failing the American people, congress earmarks $2 million for the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at the City College of New York and another $200,000 for the Andre Agassi College Preparatory Academy in Las Vegas, Nev.
The House of Representatives has recently taken an important first step in reducing earmarks by passing House Rules changes requiring that earmarked spending projects and their congressional sponsors be publicized on the internet at least 48 hours before they are considered for a vote on the floor. Under the new rules, Members of Congress will be required to justify the public need for the specific earmarked expenditures and certify that they won’t benefit financially from them. This is a good step forward, but more must be done.
The best way to reduce the number of earmarks is to pass legislation that requires that all bills and legislation be single issue or purposed. An individual bill should address one specific issue and only that issue. Any amendments must directly address that specific issue. No pork, no side issues, and especially no riders. All bills must be published and the discussions open to public scrutiny.
Limiting legislation to a single purpose will make bills more concise, and will substantially reduce the number of expensive special interest giveaways that are routinely inserted into so called “must pass” legislation without any debate. If members of congress want to fund specific projects back in their home states, let them introduce bills for these projects and let these bills be openly debated and voted on.
By:
- Posted by John WallaceJOHN W. WALLACE
Candidate for Congress
New York’s 20th Congressional District
http://www.FreedomCandidate.com