Jeb Hensarling’s Impossible Job
The Dallas Congressman keeps trying to prevent House Republicans from committing suicide. But to no avail. Despite his attempts to invoke a one-year moratorium on earmarks — only one year, for godssake — his colleagues seem intent on continuing their free spending ways. The problem seems to be mental dimness, to wit:
“I think it would be very tricky to get members to support an earmark moratorium at this point in the appropriations process,” said an aide to one top Republican on the Appropriations Committee. “Our members have already submitted thousands of project requests — and then to turn around and support a [moratorium] would allow [Rep. Dave] Obey to say, ‘OK, let’s get rid of all Republican earmarks.’ And then where would we be?”
Then where would you be? Um, in the majority maybe?
13 Comments to “Jeb Hensarling’s Impossible Job”
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I think the problem is the blanket assumption that all earmarks are bad. Three words: Trinity River Project. The Federal money is largely from earmarks added to spending bills by our elected officials.
The earmark system was designed to give an avenue to groups of citizens (like cities and counties) to obtain Federal money for community projects from the people they vote for and elect instead of being forced to get that money solely from faceless bureaucrats who may or may not care about the project or the community it’s intended to improve.
The system, to be sure, is broken and out of control and needs to be fixed, but if you remove the ability of Congress to decide now the money is spent (as apposed to blindly rubber stamping the president’s budget), we’ll all suffer and the bulk to this type of discretionary money will end up in whatever state the president happens to live in.
I agree - there ARE earmarks that are good - you can’t tar them all with the same porcine brush.
For instance, I’ve watched an earmark to a bill (I believe it was an environmental protection bill of some sort) enable a very small town (that had already levied a fairly hefty property tax rate on its citizens) to make upgrades to its sewage treatment facility so it would be TCEQ compliant, and would no longer get fined every time it rained.
I think a moratorium on all earmarks would keep congressmen and women from being able to completely use all the tools at their disposal for helping their constituents. A moratorium on unnecessary, aesthetic earmarks? Sure, I could possibly see that.
But all of them?
There’s an easy rule for determining which earmark is good and which one is bad. My earmarks are good; yours are bad.
That’s why a wholesale one-year ban on earmarks is necessary. It’s impossible at this point to delineate between the “good” earmarks and the pork.
Earmarks account for about $20B of government spending. That’s out of a $1.2 trillion budget. The budget deficit in February alone was $176B. It’s laughable all the attention earmarks get from folks like my Congressman, Rep. Hensarling.
I’m all for trimming wasteful spending, but an earmark ban is largely symbolic.
If we really wanted to do something about the deficit we’d get out of Iraq, restore some sanity to the tax code, and actually try to solve the coming entitlement deficits.
There goes Brian again, being all “logical” and refusing to tilt at windmills. He’s never getting elected to national office if he keeps thinking like that…
While I agree with all of Brian’s points, the fact that earmarks are penny-ante is what should make them easy to cut. But House Republicans can’t even do that little bit. As to Jamesn’s defense of earmarks, let us remember that the House has an appropriations process. The president only submits a budget, the House sets it. Earmarks are outside the process, largely hidden, and as we have seen, easily used for corrupt purposes. The prospect of corruption alone is a good reason to get rid of them, I would think.
Congressman Hensarling also has introduced legislation to simplify the tax code, to curb government spending by Constitutional Amendment, and to use the $20 Billion spent on earmarks to extend the child tax credit.
Facts are tricky things, it might be helpful for you to research YOUR Congressman before lobbing empty charges at him.
Thing about Jeb, though, is he didn’t get religion about earmarks until after Tom DeLay left town. When ol’ Tom told him what to vote for, he did it. Now Tom’s gone and so’s the Republican power, he wants to return to the good ol’ days. But the GOP gave all that up when they won the majority, and Jeb can’t put the toothpast back in the tube.
As a Democrat, I wish somebody on our side would shut down earmarks. As a realist, I don’t see it happening.
Remember when the Soviets spent themselves into oblivion trying to keep up with us? I think we’re going to do the same until there’s no middle class left to balance the budget on. Then there’ll actually just be the rich and the poor. And most of us will be the latter, or course.
You don’t really believe that Republicans lost control of Congress because of earmarks, do you? Unless you’re counting the Iraq War as one huge earmark, I think you’re a bit off base.
I hate to break it to you, Jamesn, but the Trinity River project IS pork. What do Federal taxpayers have to do with a park in our backyard?
If the city of Dallas can’t pay for its’ own park system, then maybe, just maybe, that park shouldn’t be built.
No, Tex, they didn’t lose Congress because of earmarks. But after they lost Congress, some people like ol’ Jeb went back to the “limited government” mantra that they had shelved during their good times. So now they want to label Democrats big spenders and bad for business. But that might not work this time. Here’s hoping, anyway.
Hey Long Memory -
Hensarling didn’t request earmarks in the majority either. And he voted to strike earmarks while in the Majority.
Facts are tricky things - but please don’t resort to lying about people.
Hensarling also bucked leadership time and again while he was in the majority. Lookup Operation Offset, which he developed despite the fact that GOP leadership railed against it.
If you ******* had voted for me instead of Hensarling back in ‘04, no one would have to listen to his nonsense now. Also, Zac should be mayor. Just sayin’.