Posted on 04/13/2010 6:04:39 PM PDT by LibertarianInExile
...Banning earmarks will not shrink the size of the federal budget. It will just mean that a bigger portion of the budget goes to Obama and his czars, while a smaller portion of the budget goes toward projects that constituents can at least get some use out of...
(Excerpt) Read more at rightosphere.com ...
Hello, there is no money.
Earmarks are corruption, not budget reducers. The fact that they are hidden from sight makes it even more so. We need to get everything on the table so people can see what is going on.
Nope, banning earmarks won’t balance the budget.
Earmarks wouldn’t be needed if the money remained in the areas the revenue was generated.
Talk about a load of crap to try to justify an unconstitutional practice. The author has no idea what he is talking about and obviously never has worked in DC. Government’s budgets are based on what is known as a baseline budget. Each year’s budget starts with the prior year’s total as a zero point baseline. All line items in the budget contribute to the total continuation of the spending each year. If your department’s budget, for example, exceeds spending by 10%, that creates a new baseline. On the other hand, if you don’t spend your entire budget, your budget is cut for the next year based on the underspending. Anyone who has ever run government contracts knows this first hand. You are ‘encouraged’ to meet or exceed all your budgeted amounts. There are no rewards for coming in under budget because it reduces future budgets.
..and another point, unused budget items DO NOT become discretionary items for the Executive branch. The executive branch has their own line for a discrectionary budget. I’m not sure what orifice they pulled this out of but I have some ideas.
The entire concept of Earmarks/Pork is the antithesis of Conservative values as not only does it increase or continue over spending, but it is no-representation spending. Rarely do earmarks have anything to do with the bills they are attached to. Spending happens by whim, not by representative voting on an issue. Earmarks are also used by the government to ‘buy’ behavior- the collectivist controlling the masses by throwing back little cookies at them by funding little pet projects.
Probably the worst excuse is that it just ‘returns money to the taxpayer’. This couldn’t be further from the truth. It is simply redistribution of funds from taxpayers to pet projects. That type of thinking is what gets us into this massive collectivist attitude of the government who thinks it can redistribute funds from those who are able to those who ‘need’.
The budget process is totally screwed up because congressional accounting is totally fraudulent. They’re spending money we don’t have and they know it even though they won’t admit to it and the MSM is in on the big lie.
The pizza analogy would only be apt if it were first stolen, then the initial stealing of the pizza was used to justify continued stealing, each time, taking more and more from the pizza maker.
His article sure reads short to me.
The author has no idea what he is talking about and obviously never has worked in DC. Government’s budgets are based on what is known as a baseline budget. Each year’s budget starts with the prior year’s total as a zero point baseline. All line items in the budget contribute to the total continuation of the spending each year. If your department’s budget, for example, exceeds spending by 10%, that creates a new baseline. On the other hand, if you don’t spend your entire budget, your budget is cut for the next year based on the underspending. Anyone who has ever run government contracts knows this first hand. You are ‘encouraged’ to meet or exceed all your budgeted amounts. There are no rewards for coming in under budget because it reduces future budgets.
WTF does all this have to do with earmarks, exactly? Everyone reading this board knows the baseline process is ridiculous. But earmarks don't affect that--they do affect the ability of a bureaucrat to spend the money on the basis of other law or his own discretion/judgment.
..and another point, unused budget items DO NOT become discretionary items for the Executive branch. The executive branch has their own line for a discrectionary budget. I’m not sure what orifice they pulled this out of but I have some ideas.
True as that obfuscatory response of yours is, directing the spending of line items DOES limit the use of line employee judgment/discretion in determining even formula funding allotments. I don't think you can disagree with the assertion that the Administration will ultimately have far more influence over federal dollars than any conservative president given the overwhelming support for Obama in the bureaucratic ranks.
The entire concept of Earmarks/Pork is the antithesis of Conservative values as not only does it increase or continue over spending, but it is no-representation spending.
C'mon, now you're being silly. Earmarks, in our process, are representative spending at its MOST transparent. You know who directed it and who wants it--just read the campaign donor list or list of major employers in the district. You rarely get that sort of idea from reading a federal bureaucratic needs assessment, even though those can be biased as hell just on the basis of RFP language.
Rarely do earmarks have anything to do with the bills they are attached to. Spending happens by whim, not by representative voting on an issue. Earmarks are also used by the government to ‘buy’ behavior- the collectivist controlling the masses by throwing back little cookies at them by funding little pet projects.
So what would non-earmark funding at say, the Department of Education through its ARRA program be? A blow for conservatism and good government?
Probably the worst excuse is that it just ‘returns money to the taxpayer’. This couldn’t be further from the truth. It is simply redistribution of funds from taxpayers to pet projects. That type of thinking is what gets us into this massive collectivist attitude of the government who thinks it can redistribute funds from those who are able to those who ‘need’.
Taking the funds in the first place is redistribution. Forcing funds back to a district from which they were obtaining is at least, on its face, somewhat reasonable. Not that I think even the author would agree the redistribution or the process is good. He's simply making the case that, if you're already having the money stolen from your home, asking the thief to spend it in your city is at least better than taking the mugging as a normal cost of doing business.
“The pizza analogy would only be apt if it were first stolen, then the initial stealing of the pizza was used to justify continued stealing, each time, taking more and more from the pizza maker.”
But to stop even asking for any pizza, while letting others take YOUR money for whatever dinner THEY want, makes no sense, either.
“The budget process is totally screwed up because congressional accounting is totally fraudulent. They’re spending money we don’t have and they know it even though they won’t admit to it and the MSM is in on the big lie.”
Amen to that BUMP!
“Hello, there is no money.”
Sure there is. It may be borrowed money, and we’ll have our grandkids’ kids paying it back, but there’s money. They’ll probably still be paying for this government largesse when we’re gone, earmarks or not. The only question is to me whether it’s MORE wrong to have a representative say “if you’re taking my constituents’ money anyway, even though I disapprove, spend it on my district or supporters this way,” as opposed to “if you’re taking it anyway, because I disapprove, take it and let the bureaucrats under executive branch direction decide how to spend it.”
Years ago I lived in a town where the elementary school didn’t have a playground for the kids on recess. Nothing but an empty field next to the school.
I don’t know whether they asked for money and were refused or what but in the end the locals decided to pay for it themselves. They held raffles and other kinds of fundraising. They hoped to raise $15,000 to build the playground and ended up with $150,000. They bought the field and built one hell of a playground. I think it was wealthy summer residents who pushed the amount up so high God bless em.
There were still people that whined about all that money going into that playground but screw em. That was donated money that wasn’t forcibly taken from anyone.
earmarks are a license to steal. by definition it is corruption.
And most earmarks are over-reaches of the Fed Gov’t...it isn’t the job of the Fed Gov’t to bail out the local cronies...like Reid’s son!!!
Proof of the power of the private sector. Unfortunately, some will twist themselves into pretzels to defend collectivist actions that they can’t even think logically.
It’s a criminal’s view of the world:
Why stand by and watch them steal when I could get me some to!
“And most earmarks are over-reaches of the Fed Gov’t...it isn’t the job of the Fed Gov’t to bail out the local cronies...like Reid’s son!!!”
That’s Indiana Jones complaining about gravel flying up from the car ahead and scratching his face—as he hangs off the front bumper of the Nazi truck! Government taking is the evil, as it’s redistributionism, no matter the method of redistribution! Are earmarks somehow more evil because they demonstrate that more transparently, or would having a nominally disinterested bureaucrat doling out the bucks make the taking more legitimate?
Leaving money in the hands of the private sector creates generosity. The fact that the money is taken in the first place creates the need for earmarks.
Locally a few years back, HUD money was used to build an “art colony”. When stimulus raised its ugly head the group that wanted the art colony announced that they had money left over and wanted to use it as seed money to bring in stimulus funds for a river arts walk.
Its disgusting. HUD using taxpayer money for pet projects and hoarding it to use as a means of collecting even more taxpayer money.
So let’s not attack them or stop...because they won’t make a difference.
Hey why even vote or try...it won’t make a difference...LOL.
Earmarks are an easy target...identify it, polarize it, make it personal and link it directly to the idiots we want to get out of office.
Most people can understand why an earmark is bad and that may be all you need to get someone to vote for someone who pledges they will not earmark.
If you tell a bank robber, still holding his gun and the loot, to spend his dough at Taco Bell, it doesn’t make you a bank robber. That you know of the robbery and who the robber is might make you culpable IF you don’t announce to everyone policing the crime of bank robbery where the bank robber is so the cops know where to find the thief, or you aid in the robbery. But simply telling a crook where to spend his ill-gotten gains isn’t the same at all as stealing the money. Were that true, an awful lot of advertising execs would be going to jail.
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