The Truth About Earmarks

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-06-2008
The Truth About Earmarks
52
Wed, 09-10-2008 - 4:37pm
(this may also satisfy ciara's curiosity from an earlier thread):

John Cole (a conservative, former GOP voter) reminds us what's at stake, and why "earmarks" are a pretty small piece of the puzzle:
The total national debt, as I write this, is $9,679,000,000,000.00 (nine and a half trillion).



The Budget for 2008 is close to $3,000,000,000,000.00 (three trillion).



Our budget deficit for this year is going to range in between $400-500,000,000,000.00 (four hundred to five hundred billion, give or take a few billion).



The total value of wasteful earmarks in 2008 (according to CAGW) will be approximately $18,000,000,000.00 (eighteen billion).



In other words, when McCain talks about earmarks, he is talking about 3% of our annual budget deficit, .6% of our annual budget, and a number too small to even report when discussing our national debt. Or, put another way, he is talking about two months in Iraq, something he wants to keep going indefinitely.



Not only are they lying about Palin’s involvements with earmarks, they are just not being serious about the horrible economic problems we face. These are not serious people.


Exactly right.

Now in darkness, world stops turning
Ashes where the bodies burning
No more war pigs have the power
Hand of God has sturck the hour
Day of judgement, God is calling
On their knees, the war pigs crawling Begging
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-03-2003
Fri, 09-12-2008 - 4:50pm

Okay, that does narrow it down some, thanks.

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-09-2008
Fri, 09-12-2008 - 5:03pm

Hmmmmmm


Looks like Obama tried to direct more than $3 mil. to a museum whose chairman is one of his largest campaign fundraisers.


http://washingtontimes.com/news/2008/sep/11/obama-museum-earmarks-draw-fire/?page=2


Why oh Why didn't he try & direct that money to the same community when he was an organizer......the one he felt he didn't make much of a difference in ?


Gee, I'd hate to look & see if Biden had any earmarks, but I do believe Obama requested $740 mil. in a 3-year period


http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/14/us/politics/14campaign.html

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-09-2008
Fri, 09-12-2008 - 5:17pm

*** Mmmm....nevertheless she CAMPAIGNED on the Bridge To Nowhere idea....AFTER Congress had pulled the plug on it.

And yet she didn't.

*** And her "decision to kill the project because it had become too expensive" doesn't explain why, for the next two years, she requested $256million and $172million in earmarks for her state, respectively. That's ten times the national average, per-capita. Far more than Obama OR Biden (and everyone else, LOL).

Let's forget your fuzzy math, or that fact that governor's don't vote on earmarks, and simply point out just because she found one project to be too expensive doesn't mean that she decided that her state didn't need federal funding. Why just look at Obama, he had his dirty little hands on nearly a BILLION in earmarks. Now that's "change."

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-09-2008
Fri, 09-12-2008 - 5:30pm

*** What must be "tedious" is maintaining the energy necessary to keep up the fantasy that you've "refuted (mark, or anyone else) 'time and again' " on this issue.

Facts aren't tedious...they simply are.

*** You haven't.

I have...time and again.

*** As Governor, did Sarah Palin, or did she NOT, request $256 million in earmarks in one year, and $172 million the next? Yes or no?

It's your propaganda...you support it.

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-09-2008
Fri, 09-12-2008 - 5:34pm

*** Okay, that does narrow it down some, thanks. I suppose when you qualify like that it'll be harder to tie her or any candidate down on earmarks, since depending on just how "abusive" is defined will determine whether it's acceptable or not.

You could start with examining the earmarks "she requested" for Alaska and point out which are frivolous, wasteful spending and which are for legitimate projects. If there is a lot of "wasteful spending" then you'll have made your case...if not...

*** To me that just leaves more room for politicians to wiggle around and get away with the "abusive" earmarks since no one individual, group, or party will have the same definition as anyone else.

I think it's pretty obvious to everyone what constitutes wasteful spending. Have a go at picking apart her earmarks and make your case.

<<< Think the left is still having trouble with that one?

*** Politicians being what they are, I figure they'll have a new one in their pocket just in case it's needed.

Probably right...Clinton sure did.

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-06-2008
Fri, 09-12-2008 - 6:59pm
The good thing is, is that Obama published his projects for public scrutiny (and as I understand it, this is seldom done). I suppose folks can always go and find out exactly what projects he has requested funding for and make up their own minds re: their wastefulness vs usefulness.


You bet they can - only, the thing is, the average voter will probably not do so....and the average GoOPer assuredly knows this - so they can continue to spew B.S. as if it were manna from heaven, saying that Palin is an anti-earmark crusader but Obama is the Senate's biggest porker....or whatever....secure in the knowledge that most people who'll read/hear/see their remarks a) won't possess the up-front knowledge to realize they're being fed s--t and being told it's Shinola, and b) won't go looking to DISCOVER that fact. It's how they win elections.

Now in darkness, world stops turning
Ashes where the bodies burning
No more war pigs have the power
Hand of God has sturck the hour
Day of judgement, God is calling
On their knees, the war pigs crawling Begging
iVillage Member
Registered: 09-06-2008
Fri, 09-12-2008 - 7:03pm
She was entitled to the per diem. Everything was transparent, above board and by the book. If you want to attack Palin, you’ll have to do it with more than propaganda.


ROFLOLOLOLOL!

THAT'S your explanation? That she was "technically entitled" to it? Man, Dick Cheney would be proud. Hey, perhaps that's a good slogan for McCain/Palin '08: "In Your Heart, You Know They're Technically Correct!"

Awe-inspiring.

Of course, back here on a place many (okay, nearly six billion) of us like to refer to as "Planet Earth," we'd call that "effluent outfall" - i.e.: raw sewage. You know as well as I do that billing the state for nights you spend in your own freaking home is wrong, you just won't admit it because it's politically inconvenient for you to do so.

Now in darkness, world stops turning
Ashes where the bodies burning
No more war pigs have the power
Hand of God has sturck the hour
Day of judgement, God is calling
On their knees, the war pigs crawling Begging
iVillage Member
Registered: 09-06-2008
Fri, 09-12-2008 - 7:07pm

Huh! That would put him on a par with Palin, who requested approximately $500 million in a two-year period.....for a state with less than a million people (less than eight-hundred-thousand, in fact). Illinois, on the other hand, has approximately 12.5 million people, making the per-capita earmark requests....ah....rather lopsided, wouldn't you say?

Just sayin'.

And only ONE of 'em is running as an "anti-earmark crusader." Which is, of course, horsepoop. Sarah Palin gives off more of a whiff of pork than any governor in the country. Perhaps Obama SHOULD have been explicitly calling her a "pig."

Now in darkness, world stops turning
Ashes where the bodies burning
No more war pigs have the power
Hand of God has sturck the hour
Day of judgement, God is calling
On their knees, the war pigs crawling Begging
iVillage Member
Registered: 09-06-2008
Fri, 09-12-2008 - 7:08pm
Of course she did. You have yet to provide any evidence which refutes this.

Now in darkness, world stops turning
Ashes where the bodies burning
No more war pigs have the power
Hand of God has sturck the hour
Day of judgement, God is calling
On their knees, the war pigs crawling Begging
iVillage Member
Registered: 09-06-2008
Fri, 09-12-2008 - 7:11pm
Facts aren't tedious...they simply are.


Well, that's certainly what ***I*** always thought....but you seem to be burdened by the attempts to deny them - and I imagine that would take quite a bit of energy to maintain. :o)

It's your propaganda...you support it.


I did, elsewhere in this same thread. If you can't be bothered to read THIS thread, then I can't be bothered to take your bloviations seriously.

Now in darkness, world stops turning
Ashes where the bodies burning
No more war pigs have the power
Hand of God has sturck the hour
Day of judgement, God is calling
On their knees, the war pigs crawling Begging