Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Pork Barrel Spending Still Alive and Well in Congress

Taxpayers for Common Sense (TCS) has been going through the omnibus to pull together a total number of earmarks and dollar amount. TCS found 8,570 disclosed earmarks worth $7.7 billion. When you add the $6.6 billion in disclosed earmarks that were in the three FY09 spending bills that passed in the fall (Defense, DHS, MilCon/VA) you end up with $14.3 billion worth of disclosed earmarks in FY09.

That's right, ladies and gentlemen, Congress especially those individuals on appropriation committees are making sure that their people back at home are benefiting from all of the government spending so that they can re-elect these people.

Here are some of the programs that are receiving money.

  • $24,000 A+ for Abstinence. Specter is sponsor.
  • $300,000 Montana World Trade Center. Rehberg sponsor.
  • $1.7 million for pig odor research in Iowa.
  • $2.1 million for the Center for Grape Genetics in New York.
  • $1.7 million for a honeybee factory in Weslaco, Texas.

Do you believe the nerve of Congress? Each claims that new jobs will be created. Can someone tell me why we need to spend $1.7 million on pig odor? Are we working on a deodorant for pigs? To me, we can do without all of this and return some of the money back to the taxpayer or truly use the money to benefit the economy.

President Obama said that earmarking would come to an end in his administration. It was one of those campaign promises as well. He said that Biden would act as "sheriff" to make sure that government money wasn't wasted. Biden, before becoming Vice President, secured $52 million for his state in earmarks. I guess Sheriff Joe is looking the other way on this one or, like Deputy Barney Fife, forgot to put the bullet in his gun. President Obama said that he would sign the spending bill with all the earmarks, because this was old business and needed to handle it. This is hogwash. (No pun intended.)

John McCain has been alerting people via Twitter about all of this pork in the spending bill. Speak up, people! This is your government at work.

THIS NEEDS TO STOP NOW!

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