In the midst of a likely recession, and instability in the global markets, the president devoted 149 words of his State of the Union address to the economic downturn and what he wants to do about it. Conversely, he gave almost exactly the same amount of attention to decrying congressional budget earmarks.
“The people’s trust in their government is undermined by congressional earmarks — special interest projects that are often snuck in at the last minute, without discussion or debate. Last year, I asked you to voluntarily cut the number and cost of earmarks in half. I also asked you to stop slipping earmarks into committee reports that never even come to a vote. Unfortunately, neither goal was met. So this time, if you send me an appropriations bill that does not cut the number and cost of earmarks in half, I’ll send it back to you with my veto.
“And tomorrow, I will issue an executive order that directs federal agencies to ignore any future earmark that is not voted on by Congress. If these items are truly worth funding, Congress should debate them in the open and hold a public vote.”
These comments, delivered early on in the speech, were music to the ears of conservatives, and congressional Republicans were delighted by the remarks. (At a recent retreat for GOP lawmakers, Republicans decided reforming the earmark process would be the key to reclaiming the congressional majority.)
I’m afraid I just can’t fathom why this has reached the top of the Republican list of domestic priorities. For one thing, pork-barrel spending exploded once the GOP controlled both Congress and the White House. (From the beginning of Republican rule in 1994 to the end in 2005, earmarks on appropriations bills went from 4,000 to 15,000.) Indeed, Bush has repeatedly signed spending bills overflowing with earmarks, and never felt the need to complain. Now, after six years of spending like drunken sailors, Republicans believe one of their worst habits is going to be the key to their political salvation? Really?
For another, for all the whining from the right, Dems have done more to improve the earmark process than Republicans ever even tried to do.
As Kevin noted the other day, “[Republicans] were all for them back when Republican districts got 60% of the pork, but suddenly they’re outraged when Republican districts only get 40%. Methinks they protest too loudly.”
The NYT’s David Kirkpatrick wrote up a pretty fair assessment of the landscape.
President Bush has never shown much distaste for Congressional pork. But in his last year in office, with his party out of power on Capitol Hill, he declared Monday that he had had enough.
In the last seven years he has signed spending bills containing about 55,000 earmarks worth more than $100 billion for projects like a new lane for a local road, a new facade for a town landmark or a weapons contract for a company that happened to be a big donor to an influential lawmaker.
Such projects tucked into the endnotes of complex spending bills at the request of individual lawmakers with almost no oversight have contributed to a mounting pileup of waste and corruption, including sending the lobbyist Jack Abramoff and the former congressman Randy Cunningham, a California Republican, to jail.
In his State of the Union address Monday night, Mr. Bush threatened to veto future spending bills unless Congress cut in half the number of earmarks, which now total more than 10,000 items and nearly $20 billion annually.
What is more, he told federal agencies to ignore any earmarks attached in the endnotes or “reports” appended to spending bills, a practice that makes them immune to amendment or excision in debate on the floor — to the fury of their critics.
The late timing of his tough talk, though, drew mostly gentle derision from those critics.
Mr. Bush was notably silent on the subject until after his fellow Republicans lost control of Congress in the 2006 midterm elections. And, now that his power has waned, his threats are almost certain not to matter.
As lawmakers know, earmarks, which make up less up less than 1 percent of the federal budget, have incalculable political value. Congressional leaders award or withhold them to reward or punish lawmakers. Incumbents like to use federal money to curry favor with donors and constituents.
In fact, Representative Jeff Flake, an Arizona Republican who has crusaded against earmarks, said when Republicans ran Congress, “we honed the practice.”
But complaining about earmarks is much easier when your party is not writing the spending bills.
Best of all, Congress frequently doesn’t send the president any spending bills for the next fiscal year during a presidential campaign — meaning all of last night’s talk was meaningless and shallow bluster.
Something to keep in mind today when we hear the inevitable talk about Bush’s new-found distaste for earmarks.