Going for the cheap applause now.
Earmarks total about $30 billion of a $3 TRILLION budget. Sure, there’s waste, but also so good local projects. But this little coward keeps flapping his gums about earmarks, 1/1000th of the budget(or is it 1/10,000?). Eliminate them all and you’ve done very little.
It’s entitlements, interest on the (growing) debt, and the military where the big money is. What’s you plan, Juan?
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If they are good 'small' projects, they should be funded at the state or local level. This is a $400 per family gift forced on us by a Congress that mistakenly believes that Tax Revenue is theirs for the keeping or theirs for the giving. Frankly, I just wish that they each took a one million dollar kitty to keep or spend. That would cost 1/100 what the earmarks do.
With apologies to Everett Dirksen: "30 billion here, 30 billion there, pretty soon you're talking about some real money."