Washington’s earmark largess… more government bloat, snowballing budget deficits, economic stagnation, growing peril for U.S. Dollar…
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House Republicans prove themselves unserious by refusing to ban earmarks.
By Kimberley A. Strassel, Dec. 1, 2022 – Excerpts:
Self-awareness isn’t one of the modern GOP’s strong suits, as House Republicans proved again this week. If the party is still confused as to why voters didn’t trust them in greater numbers, it might consider that it isn’t trustworthy.
Leader Kevin McCarthy in September unveiled to great fanfare the party’s Commitment to America, which vowed that Republicans would “curb wasteful government spending” that feeds inflation and the national debt. Hundreds of Republican candidates stormed their districts, waving Commitment pocket cards and pronouncing on fiscal discipline and oversight.
Then came Wednesday’s first test of whether this was all hot air, and it turns out a fleet of dirigibles wouldn’t have held the gas. California Rep. Tom McClintock moved to repeal the recent party rule allowing earmarks. The caucus routed his motion, voting it down 158-52. Commitment to America? More like Commitment to Spoils.
The vote came despite a vigorous campaign by independent conservative groups. “Earmarks are one of the most corrupt, inequitable, and wasteful practices in the history of Congress,” read a letter signed by representatives of 15 groups, including Heritage Action, Club for Growth, FreedomWorks, Americans for Tax Reform and Citizens Against Government Waste. The groups told lawmakers it was “your first opportunity to demonstrate to taxpayers that the election of a Republican majority in the House will be accompanied by a serious effort to restore and maintain fiscal responsibility.” So much for that.
The GOP swore off earmarks in 2011, when it stood for something other than investigations. But when a Democratic Congress in 2021 announced intentions to bring them back, GOP trough-feeders rushed to sign up. At least in March 2021, the vote was closer: 102-84. But that was before members got hooked on the earmark drug. Some 120 Republicans partook in the subsequent earmark free-for-all, snorting up nearly $5 billion for their states and districts. And the addicts aren’t interested in rehab.
They hide behind GOP appropriators like Arkansas Rep. Steve Womack, who in recent years have draped their spending in the cloak of “constitutional duty.” According to Mr. Womack, spending on specific pork projects is a way of asserting lawmakers’ “authority” to make spending decisions rather than ceding it to the Biden administration. He suggests, with a straight face, that earmarks are central to “our job controlling spending.”
This is hilarious, considering that the GOP continues to cede all spending decisions to the administration outside the isolated pork members siphon back home. Even as the GOP spenders high-fived their earmark triumph, 41 House Republicans on Thursday voted with all Democrats to give the Justice Department $50 million to hand out in grants to create re-entry programs for former prisoners. Attorney General Merrick Garland will have unilateral control over this money—deciding which communities benefit and which nonprofits get a check. In a floor speech on the bill, Mr. McClintock noted that grant making has become the “third-biggest expenditure of the federal government, behind only Social Security and national defense”—costing half a trillion dollars a year, or approximately $4,000 from an average family’s taxes.
Republicans could insist that contracts be competitively bid out. They don’t. They could insist on accountability—conditioning further dollars on the performance of past ones. But that would take work, and it isn’t nearly as much fun as grandstanding as a constitutionalist while bagging $1 million for the St. Louis Symphony (Missouri Sen. Roy Blunt) or $650,000 for feral swine management (Arkansas Sen. John Boozman) or $4.2 million for a sheep experiment station (Idaho Rep. Mike Simpson). Good thing Mr. Biden wasn’t in control of those dollars! Imagine the waste!
If Republicans are that concerned about Biden decisions, they could simply zero out budgets. But that might make people unhappy. Or Congress could do its job by actually debating, marking up and passing its 12 annual spending bills on time. That’s something no Congress has managed to do in 25 years.
Rousing a party to do uncomfortable things is the leader’s job. But on the topic of earmarks, Mr. McCarthy put his finger to the wind and took the bold stance of . . . not weighing in. Is it any wonder he’s having trouble convincing 218 Republicans he has the mettle for the job? Meanwhile, the Senate’s spender-in-chief, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, is using Mr. McCarthy’s organizing travails as reason to bleed taxpayers more. The theory is that House Republicans won’t be able to corral the votes for a start-of-year spending solution. The answer is for Senate Republicans to sign off on another eye-watering black-hole omnibus, full of (what else?) earmarks.
What an opening impression. If Republicans can’t muster the backbone to get rid of earmarks that are an affront to spending discipline, good governance and federalism, voters won’t muster the enthusiasm to keep them in charge.
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Washington Republicans have no ‘backbone’ to oppose Washington Democrats and their destructive plans for America, benefiting, paradoxically, wealthy elites and those riding welfare gravy train.
While Washington Republicans have no plan to strengthen the lot of America’s hard-working, tax-paying, God-fearing U.S. citizens – the true ‘backbone of America…
Main Street Republicans do have a plan:
The Leviticus 25 Plan – An Economic Acceleration Plan for America
$90,000 per U.S. citizen – Leviticus 25 Plan 2023 (5472 downloads)