Those Tiny Little Piggies

For all of Tennessee Democrat Jim Cooper's righteous indignation about earmarks and his refusals to bring any more to Middle Tennessee, it sure looks like the teeth-gnashing is much ado about little. That legislative pork makes up 1% of the entire federal budget. It's like a sensationalist, distracting sideshow to pay so much attention to such a tiny fraction of the budget.

So, one moderate blogger has a proposal:

Instead of forcing legislators to hide earmarks inside their various legislative efforts, let’s just agree to put them all into one annual bill called “Special Spending.” The bill’s total would equal about 1% of total federal spending for each fiscal year and would be passed only after all other budgetary legislation has been completed.

All Congressional members would be free to bargain, cajole, trade, and negotiate the types and amounts of all their specific projects in this one piece of legislation. The Press and American public would finally find earmarks all in one place and eventually could reward or punish their legislators in the next elections. Each “earmark” would also have to list all its Congressional sponsors in order to be inserted in the total bill.

I could get on board with this proposal, but I do not see many conservatives going along with this because they get so much more mileage out of exaggerating the size and effects of pork brought back to constituent districts. It seems like Blue Dog Democrats would cease to exist if there weren't any earmark-laden non-earmark-related bills to get all hot-under-the-collar about.

The $100,000 Toolbag Orbiting to Nowhere

Where does NASA get off charging that much money for a canvas bag, a couple of grease guns, and a trash bag? If they're going to throw away large sums of our money at least do it with a little style: have Astronaut Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper stuff a scraper in a crocodile tote from one of Italy's leading luxury leather houses before fumbling it away.

Congressional Liberals Would Rather Switch Than Fight?

The Monkey Cage points out that the Congress members who sold out their opposition to the bail out bill were most likely to be liberal:

[T]he 33 Democratic switchers are more liberal and more junior than other Democrats. Interestingly, one-third of the Democratic switchers are members of the Congressional Black Caucus; CBC members were significantly more likely than their Democratic colleagues to switch their votes in favor of the bailout. Press reports suggest that Barack Obama had lobbied many of the CBC members, urging their support for the package.

And the lesson to Democratic Blue Dogs at the other end of the spectrum: if you want others to embrace the pain of bailing out, you are either going to have a powerful individual busting heads or forsake your abdication of your constituents' earmarks, because the other great motivator besides Obama was what is called "pork."

A Slice of that "Necessity"

Via Joe Powell:

The 400-plus pages legislation the Senate approved includes funding to the film industry in Puerto Rico and a tax break for makers of "certain wooden arrows designed for use by children".

An extraordinary step from one angle looks like business as usual from another. Gives the term, "mother of invention," a whole new meaning.

LA Times Confirms that Sarah Palin Indeed Said "Yes" to Bridge to Nowhere

Apparently, Sarah Palin's newly fitted persona as reformer of earmarks is being questioned by Alaskan leaders:

Since Palin was named the Republican vice presidential nominee two weeks ago, she has been boasting that she told Congress that Alaska didn't want the hundreds of millions that had been earmarked for the bridge.

But in 2006, Palin stood before residents in this region during her gubernatorial campaign and expressed support for the bridge. It became apparent after she was elected that the state's portion would be too costly, and Palin ordered transportation officials to abandon the project.

She held on to the $223 million in federally earmarked funds for other uses, such as the Gravina road, approved by her predecessor.

"Here's my question," said Ketchikan Mayor Bob Weinstein. "If Sarah Palin is not being truthful on an issue like the Gravina bridge project, what else is she not being truthful about?" ....

"If the bridge was canceled, give the money back, or get the earmark removed, or redesign the road so it's better for development," he said. "Especially if you're opposed to earmarks, and now you're telling the world you're opposed to earmarks."

His frustration came to a head after he heard Republican presidential nominee John McCain and Palin tout her reputation as a reformer focused on saving taxpayer money. He didn't feel much better when a campaign ad called them "the original mavericks," and said: "She stopped the 'bridge to nowhere.'"

Weinstein need only glance across the salmon-rich waters separating his city from Gravina Island to see what he believes are millions of dollars being spent unnecessarily. Why, he asks, didn't she stop that?

Probably for the same reasons she won't stop lying about her opposition to the bridge now.


UPDATE: True lies to the latest Muppet Baby, Sean Hannity:

Free Money up North: Under Palin Each Alaskan Draws Thousands from the State Oil Account While Federal Earmarks Flood in

More from the Seattle Times:

Palin's requests to Congress [for millions in earmarks] came at a time of huge federal deficits, while Alaska state revenue was soaring due to rising oil prices and a major tax increase on oil production that Palin signed into law in late 2007.

As a result, Alaska this year was in such a money-flushed condition — with no state income tax or sales tax and total state revenues of $10 billion, double the previous year's — that Palin gained legislative approval for $1,200 cash payments to every Alaskan.

In addition, each Alaska resident gets an annual dividend check, about $2,000 this year, from Alaska's oil-wealth savings account, known as the Permanent Fund, now fattened to more than $35 billion.

The state also has been able to tap into a gusher of federal money as its Republican congressional delegation rose in seniority and clout.

The rest of America is literally subsidizing Governor Sarah Palin to pay each Alaskan thousands of dollars per year (it's no wonder her popularity is up at 80%) without having to worry about raising taxes for infrastructure. We are the saps paying for her infrastructure and insuring that she stays in good with Alaskans and looks good as John McCain's VP pick.

And the thing is, conservatives lop off any mention of earmarks when they speak glowingly of Sarah Palin as if she's actually some kind of whiz-bang budget manager and not simply building her career on the largess of taxpayers in the other 49 states. They say, "Look what she's doing without taxes!" But that's another lie. She's doing it with taxes. She's doing it exclusively with somebody else's taxes.

That's another thing to think about when you're pumping gas: how you are helping to subsidize annual dividend checks of $2,000 to every single Alaskan.

Après-Ski: Mayor Sarah Palin's Lobbyists Secured $27 Million for Wasilla during Her Second Term; More as Governor

According to Wikipedia:

[During her second mayoral term, Sarah Palin] hired the Anchorage-based lobbying firm of Robertson, Monagle & Eastaugh to lobby for earmarks for Wasilla. The effort was led by Steven Silver, a former chief of staff for Senator Ted Stevens, ... and it secured nearly $27 million in funds. The earmarks included $500,000 for a youth shelter, $1.9 million for a transportation hub, $900,000 for sewer repairs, and $15 million for a rail project linking Wasilla and the ski resort community of Girdwood .... Some of the earmarks were criticized by Senator McCain in 2001 and 2002.

And this is just the proverbial tip of the iceberg.

Last week the Seattle Times underscored the stark realism of Sarah Palin's history of lobbying for earmarks:

But earmarks have never been a dirty word in Alaska, a huge state dotted with small communities that have enormous dollar needs for sewers, roads and other projects.

Instead, earmarks — pet projects that members of Congress fund but that no federal agency has requested — have become a mainstay of political life here, and one that Palin embraced from early on in her career as a mayor of Wasilla to the governor's mansion in Juneau.

Just this year, she sent to Sen. Ted. Stevens, R-Alaska, a proposal for 31 earmarks totaling $197 million — more, per person, than any other state.

You know, it's not really the price of these earmarks that make Sarah Palin's leadership so obscene, it's the campaign energy she's putting into arguing the lie that because she has fought earmarks she is a good choice for reforming Washington. That's why this is all one huge obscenity.

I Wonder If Sarah Palin Ever Read BillHobbs.com in 2005?

I've been mulling the following exchange from Sarah Palin's interview this week:

CHARLIE GIBSON: But you were for [the bridge to nowhere] before you were against it. You were solidly for it for quite some period of time .... until Congress pulled the plug.

PALIN: What I supported was the link between a community and its airport. And we have found that link now.

It sounds innocent enough, but something seems fishy to me about the airport excuse, so I decided to root around some of the local bloggers who have opposed pork (sorry I have to add this disclaimer, but times being what they are: no reference to Sarah Palin intended in any of these pig references). Back in 2005, Bill Hobbs quoted one of his readers and he seemed to express agreement that it is frightful that the airport could be used to justify the bridge to nowhere:

From a reader's email:

Today's Wall Street Journal contains a letter from Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska rebutting an article or editorial on the "Bridge to Nowhere." She lays out the best case possible, citing the natural resources to be developed on the island and the amount of maritime commerce done there.

Then she points out that residents of the area have been asking for a bridge for thirty years, "ever since the federal government built an airport on the island." WHAT? That's when I lost it. Why did the federal government build an airport on this island 30 years ago? My guess is the argument was that the island needed a taxpayer-funded airport because it didn't have a taxpayer-funded bridge to get there. The sad part is that she probably didn't realize how pathetic she sounded. Pork being used to justify pork. It's a frightful culture in Washington.

That it is.

I guess times and people change. Back in 2005, the prospect of using the porkbarrel airport as justification for the porkbarrel bridge to nowhere was frightening for a conservative blogger. Now that Bill Hobbs is in charge of communications of Tennessee's Republican Party, he does not seem too frightened by Palin's use of the justification. In fact, Hobbs is now defending her performance in the ABC interview and rationalizing that she did stop the bridge to nowhere.

A couple of weeks after the "frightful" post, Hobbs quoted another blogger bemoaning the same fact that many Palin critics, 3 years later, are decrying: that Sarah Palin was still getting the earmark money even though the bridge was 86'ed by Congress:

Radley Balko says despite this victory, it means very little to the real porkbusting efforts:

All the conference committee did was remove the earmark for the bridges. Alaska will still be getting the same obscene amount of money from the federal government, it's just that the state won't be required to use it to build those two particular bridges. It'll be up to the executive and the state legislature to decide how to spend it.

Again it is evident in Hobbs' remarks that his sympathy is with the critic of the Alaskan earmark. The fact that Sarah Palin would still be getting the money to spend to build something to a porkbarrel airport seemed to make the victory a hollow one.

So, in 2008, why can't Sarah Palin's critics demand that she be more accountable for her use of earmarks and take some of the responsibility for supporting the bridge to nowhere? Why should we not question as Bill Hobbs did in 2005 whether using the airport is a good excuse for accepting the earmarks? Why should we now lend Sarah Palin's defense any credence if we're not communications officials of the Republican Party, which has made the mistake of nominating her?

The Serial Lying of Sarah Palin

Sarah Palin cannot even just concede that she was for the bridge to nowhere before she was against it. Reading the manuscript of the ABC interview like watching graphic mutilation of the truth by a series of torturous qualifications:

GIBSON: You have said continually, since he chose you as his vice-presidential nominee, that I said to Congress, thanks but not thanks. If we're going to build that bridge, we'll build it ourselves.

PALIN: Right.

GIBSON: But it's now pretty clearly documented. You supported that bridge before you opposed it. You were wearing a t-shirt in the 2006 campaign, showed your support for the bridge to nowhere.

PALIN: I was wearing a t-shirt with the zip code of the community that was asking for that bridge. Not all the people in that community even were asking for a $400 million or $300 million bridge.

GIBSON: But you turned against it after Congress had basically pulled the plug on it; after it became apparent that the state was going to have to pay for it, not the Congress; and after it became a national embarrassment to the state of Alaska. So do you want to revise and extend your remarks.

PALIN: It has always been an embarrassment that abuse of the ear form -- earmark process has been accepted in Congress. And that's what John McCain has fought. And that's what I joined him in fighting. It's been an embarrassment, not just Alaska's projects. But McCain gives example after example after example. I mean, every state has their embarrassment.

GIBSON: But you were for it before you were against it. You were solidly for it for quite some period of time...

PALIN: I was...

GIBSON: ... until Congress pulled the plug.

PALIN: I was for infrastructure being built in the state. And it's not inappropriate for a mayor or for a governor to request and to work with their Congress and their congressmen, their congresswomen, to plug into the federal budget along with every other state a share of the federal budget for infrastructure.

GIBSON: Right.

PALIN: What I supported was the link between a community and its airport. And we have found that link now.

See, she was "for infrastructure being built in the state." It could be any infrastructure; it really didn't matter what kind.

She really wants us to believe that she's that indiscriminate about her priorities? That she was just for any infrastructure which just incidentally included the bridge to nowhere?

And the t-shirt just randomly fell on her torso when she innocently assumed she was touting a zip code rather than a bridge?

How can watching Republicans operate not be an insult to anyone's intelligence?

You Can't Put Lipstick on a $3.2 Million Seal if the Grizzly Can't Have Some, Too

The McCain campaign is talking out both sides of its pie hole on earmarks, given Sarah Palin's request for millions to study seal DNA.

Sarah Palin's $2 Million Earmark for the Study of Crab Mating Habits

The self-proclaimed reformer of earmarks--and the "Ice Man" that "Maverick" John McCain never leaves home without--once asked America as Governor to earmark a couple of million to see how spider crabs hump. She also asked for a $3.2 million earmark for seals. That's a mighty peculiar way of eschewing earmarks, Sarah Palin. More honesty would be a good thing.

How Can Sarah Palin Claim to Have Reformed Earmarks When Alaska Sucks Up Pork?

Sarah Palin can repeat "reformed earmarks" like John McCain repeats "POW," but the amount of pork rolling into her state begets anything but reform:

Now You Can Keep Score of Sarah Palin's Lies to Nowhere at Home!