I tell you what, if I have to listen to people rail against earmarks for any longer, I may just go postal. Earmarks are an easy target for many politicians in Washington. Political leaders like John McCain have basically made a living railing against these "special projects" that "inserted in the middle of the night" into spending bills. According to these politicians, the earmarks waste money and increase our deficits. The only problem with that line of thinking is that it doesn't accurately describe what earmarks are. Earmarks are not new spending!!! Let me say it again: Earmarks are not new spending! If all 100 senators would vow to never again put an earmark into a bill it wouldn't save one dime. People are angry about earmarks because they don't understand the process. This is how it works: Congress appropriates money to certain agencies within the federal government, congressional members earmark portions of that already appropriated money to go to specific areas of their choosing. Thus, if there was no such thing as "earmarking"...the executive and the agencies under him would just spend the money any way they want to. Thus earmarking is a way for Congress to dictate to the President and government agencies on how taxpayer money should be spent. It is a good way to keep the powers of the executive in check. Granted, many of the earmarks are seen as wasteful spending and there does need to be more transparency within the earmarking process. However, who is to say that bureaucrats in federal agencies will not spend money on "wasteful" projects. I would much rather have Congress in charge of spending than giving the executive more and more power. If Washington wants to save money, cutting earmarks is a worthless way to do so. So stand up for the earmarking process!
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Here we part ways, my friend. That's why they call it "pork." In D.C., an earmark can buy you that vote. But what we're left with lots of things we don't need but still have to pay for. Dumb studies are the worse, but public buildings with people's names on them are right up there.
Let me explain a little further: I'm not defending wasteful earmarks like you have explained. My beef is more with people like John McCain who say that we need to ban all earmarks because it will save money. As I explained in my post that idea is just not true because the money attached to earmarks have already been appropriated.
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