Political Greed

The American Spectator ^ | 2009-04 | U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint

[rabscuttle385]

As strange as it sounds, one of the greatest threats to individual liberty in the United States is an obscure legislative tactic called "earmarking." As you probably know, earmarks are provisions individual senators or representatives drop into congressional spending bills to fund specific projects, usually in their home state or district. Members of Congress insert these provisions to circumvent the usual process by which executive branch agencies decide how to spend the funds Congress gives them. Earmarks are the means by which low-priority projects are funded in favor of higher-priority projects: you could call it affirmative action for pork.

Earmarks are also the means by which Americans are conditioned to believe that the purpose of their congressman and senators is to get money for their districts and states. And with all good intentions, earmarks are the means by which our free market is being swallowed by an increasingly socialist state.

Take any bill in Congress that impinges on a sector of our economy or on individual liberty itself, and you will find it festooned with earmarks to assuage the concerns of congressmen and senators otherwise unwilling to accept the slow creep of collectivism.

[rabscuttle385]

Editor's Note: "Freedom is a fragile thing and is never more than one generation away from extinction," Ronald Reagan said in 1967. "It is not ours by inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation, for it comes only once to a people." This month we launch a new column -- Freedom Watch -- in which prominent political figures comment on matters connected to this great Reaganite theme, which is being challenged in ways even Reagan may not have anticipated. It's particularly important that the words with which Reagan completed his thought never have to be tested: "Those who have known freedom and then lost it, have never known it again."

[rabscuttle385]

Take any bill in Congress that impinges on a sector of our economy or on individual liberty itself, and you will find it festooned with earmarks to assuage the concerns of congressmen and senators otherwise unwilling to accept the slow creep of collectivism.

ping!

[SpaceBar]

earmarks are provisions bribes

[bamahead]

Take any bill in Congress that impinges on a sector of our economy or on individual liberty itself, and you will find it festooned with earmarks to assuage the concerns of congressmen and senators otherwise unwilling to accept the slow creep of collectivism.

Bribery.



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[Pearls Before Swine]

I disagree. Earmarking is symptomatic of a more fundamental problem: the ability of legislators to drop in “riders” which have nothing to do with the main, titled thrust of a bill. Sometimes the bill is a stub, or a Trojan Horse, whose main purpose is to allow Congress to slip in a rider which does the real damage. These ought to be outlawed and challenge-able: A bill should state in its title and preamble exactly what it is about.

[mulligan]

Earmarks are bad, but are such a small part of a much greater problem. And that is the year after year deficit spending by an incompetent and greedy group of politicians. This causes inflation and thus devaluation of our dollar. A group that cares more about power and re-elction than they do the welfare of our Nation.

[Pearls Before Swine]

And that is the year after year deficit spending by an incompetent and greedy group of politicians.

And that's another thing! As Milton Friedman said, "the burden of government is not measured by the amount it taxes, but rather by the amount it spends."

[upchuck]

Jim DeMint Ping!

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[JoeFromSidney]

With all due respect to Senator DeMint, I disagree. Earmarks are not the problem. His explanation is that Congress earmarks money for low priority projects rather than the high priority projects preferred by the Executive Branch. But who sets the priorities? Are we to believe that the Executive Branch is better qualified to set priorities than is the Congress? For that matter, why should we believe that either is qualified to set priorities?

The real problem is that not only the earmarks themselves, but much of the rest of the appropriations bills, are unconstitutional. They appropriate money for things over which Congress has no authority. Article I, Section 8, does NOT give Congress authority to appropriate money for museums, mass transit, farm subsidies, or bailouts. We should be focusing on the unconstitutional aspect of what Congress does. While earmarks gain public interest, they are only a small part of a big problem.

[dcwusmc]

You are absolutely correct, IMO. Thanks.

[gargoyle]

...I fully agree, the premise is correct, the facts are wrong...