The biggest rage now is for politicians in Washington to condemn earmarks as corruption, and a waste of taxpayer money!
It is precisely the opposite of the above, as earmarks provide improvements in public services to every state and congressional district, and provide jobs and promote economic growth!
It is a demagogic issue, as those now coming out against earmarks are the ones who have been most engaged in advocating it for their entire congressional careers!
People seem to want services for their district or state, but not for other districts or states! This is greed and selfishness, and it is often forgotten that if a Congressman or Senator does not bring home money for projects in their districts and states, they are likely to be defeated for re-election as they have not “brought home the bacon”!
Citizens want projects done, but not where they have to pay for it! They want others to pay, rather than face the responsibility for paying taxes! In other words, they are hypocrites, as are their politicians who now advocate ending earmarks!
To top it off, earmarks are a measly one percent of the national budget! It is a “drop in the bucket” when one talks about expenditures! It is similar to the argument to stop foreign aid to other nations, which is also only one percent of the budget, but citizens are ignorant of the importance of foreign aid to stabilize other nations in our national interest!
The fastest way to cut the budget is to cut unnecessary defense spending caused by corruption in the corporate world, which promotes cost overruns on unnecessary weapons systems, considering that we already have a defense budget greater than the rest of the world combined!
Cutting earmarks will be a fad that will be short lived, as “pork” is part of the reality of politics, and always will be!
Politicians need to get real when talking about this issue. Earmarks are the classic straw man when it comes to talking about the federal budget. It’s easy to condemn the spending of money in someone else’s district as the root of all evil when talking about ‘waste’. Since the practice is so engrained in American politics, and earmarks themselves make up so little of total spending, the focus of politicians on this issues during campaigns is what’s really a waste. Fact is we need real ideas to get us out of this mess; and the constant demagougery shows that our leaders have yet to come up with comprehensive solutions for the future economy of this country.