Should members of Congress be required to identify all their earmark requests, not just the earmarks they obtain?

Yes

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by Jimmy Ettele

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With the passage of the Legislative Transparency and Accountability Act of 2006, in the later half of 2006, government tried to bring about an end to the waste filled spending on the American people's tax dollar. The bill was originally formulated with the idea of naming who was earmarking and what amount they intended on. The bill, after two major revisions, finally passed and here we are, the back half of 2008, with the Transparency and Accountability Act in full motion, and a defense spending bill for 2008 garnered itself 936 earmarks totalling over five billion dollars. If the job of the Transparency bill was to point out the transparency in it's own Act, then bravo to our lawmakers, they have succeeded.

As with most everything else in Washington, items needing attention and reform get more laws and bills tacked on to them. More of a show to put on to the voting public than to actually do any good, these bills serve to reinforce contradiction, vague yet confusing language, and the notion that government has no problem dipping into our collective wallets and spending our money on projects like the $14 million spent in South Dakota for defense projects(I knew Sioux Falls was in trouble). Instead of clogging up lanes of solutions with governmental hairball reform bills, let us keep it simple. Begin mandating that every earmark by any and all Senators and or Congressmen be made known to the public via any and all mediums available within a given time frame.

As kids, when we panhandled our parents for meager trace percentages of money from their hard earned week, the first question from the First National Bank of Dad was, "What do you need that for?". Stammering along some 'uh's' and 'um's' as you tried to explain exactly why it was so important for Dad to give you the twenty bucks needed to obtain the newest Hasbro action figure or Disney's current teen queen anything, it quickly became apart the twenty bucks would be better spent in Dad's wallet. So as our government spends like children then so we should begin to treat our government as children. Making them write a list out of all the ways they would like to spend our money is one way to teach them a modicum of fiscal responsibility.

It wasn't until Ted Stevens realized how insane he was(or he saw his chance of re-election dwindle) did he relinquish the thought of spending millions on building a bridge in Alaska. Senators and Congressman should have to list everything they intend to use millions of potentially allocated dollars for. Maybe by the time they are finished with their 'Dear Santa' lists for taxpayer money, they will have regained a measure of lucidity and scribble some of the things out? By putting these items out in the open, where the people funding them could see, quite possibly we would see a huge reduction in the number of earmarks sucking to bills like remora eels? Nothing gets the gears of government moving quite like the threat of looming voter backlash, does it?

The other advantage to listing out the earmarks our government shills might enjoy, is a renewed confidence in earmarks. Right now, the word 'earmark' is as toxic as being labelled a 'Bush Repbulican'(and President Bush doesn't even want to be a Bush Republican). By labelling the earmarks and making them available to the country, the government puts the onus on us. Instead of adding to the growing sentiment of government's secret and sneaky dealings, we, as the voting members of society, would have a chance to voice our outrages over $2 million for hibernation genomics. Our outrage may result in our prestigious senators and congressmen switching from their fountain pens to a Bic erasable ink to scratch off anything that is written down by Charles Taylor from North Carolina(named in 2006 by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington as one of the twenty most corrupt US legislators.-wikiped ia) What would be left are items that most may feel are needed as some earmarks do warrant serious consideration.

Let them ask for it. If it is so important to have, government officials should have no problem presenting their requests to the American public for scrutinization. It would be refreshing, since the $5 billion check is slid down the table to the taxpayers and we didn't even get to eat the dinner, if our government had the confidence and conviction in what they are asking for. Our government was supposed to be founded by the people and for the people(though any senator originating in Alaska will tell you that funding the migration patterns of penguins is a gift for all to enjoy). If government needs all this money so badly, let them do what everyone else not growing fat in Washington has to do...sell baked goods. Have a car wash(you could charge extra for SUV's and in Washington, there are no shortages of SUV's). Hold a 10k run where people could donate per 'K' or one total amount. Let them go door to door to American's asking for some money for their pet projects(God help them if they run into your dad though). Or better yet just have them write it down and send it to us for us to identify as "needed".

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