Posted on April 22, 2008 by Martin Rundle
The White House is seeking more than $2.5 million in FY2009 to cover the Perks of Office enjoyed by our ex-Commanders-in-Chief, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush, and Bill Clinton. Among the items taxpayers will be covering: Clinton’s $79,000 phone tab, $111,000 Bush is seeking for “other services,” and Carter’s $15,000 request for postage.
The largest line item is $544,000 [...]
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Posted on April 17, 2008 by Libby Wright
Rep. Tom Feeney (R-Fla.) has written this special to the Orlando Sentinel. You can read it here and I encourage you to do so, but I put a teaser just below. He offers an economic analysis that politicians and taxpayers would be wise to think about.
“A market bubble is created by easy-money policy and speculative investment followed by a [...]
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Posted on April 10, 2008 by Libby Wright
I was at the official unveiling of Rep. John Campbell’s legislation, “Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is” today. This bill would amend the Tax Code to allow individuals to voluntarily pay more in taxes. It would also place a line on the IRS tax form to make it real easy for them to give [...]
Filed under: Budget, Pork, Taxes | 2 Comments »
Posted on April 9, 2008 by Leslie Paige
because that wouldn’t be fair. It’s just that his list of earmark requests for fiscal year 2009 happens to be among the first to begin trickling out to the public.
It won’t be long until he is joined by a legion of other pork-barrel spenders and we’ll try to keep you abreast of the tsunami of requests that continue to roll into the committees. [...]
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Earmarks, Pig Book, Pork, Waste | No Comments »
Posted on March 20, 2008 by Alexa Moutevelis
March
Rhetorical Flim-Flam
By Alexa Moutevelis=In the wake of the March 13 vote on a one-year moratorium on congressional earmarks, it is time for a post-mortem on who said what in the heat of the battle.
Corn Ethanol is Not a Panacea
By Elizabeth Wright
All is not rosy with corn ethanol and other biofuels, according to a February 7 [...]
Filed under: Budget, Earmarks, Pork, Waste, Wastewatcher | No Comments »
Posted on March 14, 2008 by Alexa Moutevelis
In a disappointing 29-71 loss, the DeMint-McCain earmark moratorium amendment to the FY 09 Budget failed last night.
Sen. DeMint made the following comments in a press release following the vote:
“Tonight, too many in Congress embraced the earmark favor factory and proved why we have the lowest approval rating in history,” said Senator DeMint. “Earmarks represent [...]
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Posted on March 12, 2008 by Leslie Paige
Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) took to the Senate floor just minutes ago and made his case for a full-year, no-exceptions earmark moratorium (link to whole speech)
Here’s a slideshow from Sen. DeMint’s Earmark Moratorium Rally, featuring PigFoot in many slides.
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Earmarks, Pork, Reform, Video, Waste | 1 Comment »
Posted on March 10, 2008 by Alexa Moutevelis
Tomorrow CCAGW will participate in a rally in support of the DeMint-McCain earmark moratorium amendment. Here’s a look where key players in the drama stand, according to Roll Call:
Reid Won’t Back Ban on Earmarks
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) will not back a moratorium on Congressional earmarks despite growing interest among House and Senate Republicans [...]
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Earmarks, In The News, Pork, Reform | 1 Comment »
Posted on March 6, 2008 by Libby Wright
The House and the Senate Budget Committees are in the process of releasing their budget resolutions for 2008. A little advice: hang onto your wallets.
I urge you to learn about and get involved in the budget process. One good way is to go to Budget School that is being sponsored by the Republican Study Committee, [...]
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Posted on March 5, 2008 by Libby Wright
Today, the House Budget Committee is marking-up their fiscal 2009 Budget Resolution. Can you say “tax and spend?” The Committee has just taken a break…it is a lot of work to spend your money! One little item came up with some interesting results.
Thank goodness there are some fiscal conservatives still left in Washington. During the mark-up, [...]
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Posted on February 5, 2008 by Alexa Moutevelis
See Pres. Tom Schatz discuss the President’s budget on CNBC’s Pork Watch - every Tuesday at 6:40am.
Filed under: Budget, In The News, Media Hits, Video | No Comments »
Posted on January 31, 2008 by Alexa Moutevelis
The GAO just released a report called ”Congressional Directives: Selected Agencies’ Processes for Responding to Funding Instructions,” or in layman’s terms - Earmarks: How They Detract from Agencies’ Priorities.
The agencies that the GAO looked at were the Department of Defense, Department of Energy, Department of Transportation, and the U.S. Army Corps. of Engineers’ Civil Works programs.
CAGW pulled from each [...]
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Defense, Earmarks, Energy, In The News, Pork, Transportation | No Comments »
Posted on January 30, 2008 by Alexa Moutevelis
CAGW in conjunction with the Washington Policy Center just unveiled the Washington State Piglet Book: Connecting the Dots on How Government Wastes Your Money, the definitive guide for reducing waste, abuse, and mismanagement in the Washington state government.
Filed under: Budget, Piglet, State Issues | 2 Comments »
Posted on January 23, 2008 by Leslie Paige
Take a look at this submission by Public Citizen’s lobbyist Craig Holman which appeared in yesterday’s Roll Call ($):
‘Bridges to Nowhere’ Are No More
Call them earmarks, if you must, but they ain’t the “pork” of yesteryear. Minnesota Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D) and Norm Coleman (R) added a $195 million earmark to the omnibus appropriations bill to rebuild the collapsed [...]
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Defense, Earmarks, In The News, Media Hits, Pig Book, Pork, Reform, Waste | No Comments »
Posted on January 15, 2008 by Leslie Paige
Read this article on the recommendations released today by the The National Surface Transportation and Revenue Study Commission on how to address and pay for our future transportation needs.
We knew this was coming. It won’t take long before this report, which was weighted heavily with commissioners who were pre-disposed in favor of massive gas tax increases to fund [...]
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Earmarks, In The News, Pork, Waste | No Comments »
Posted on January 15, 2008 by Leslie Paige
CAGW VP for Policy David Williams appeared on Fox Business Network on Friday evening to denounce the congressional pay raise. Here is a link to the video: part 1 and part 2.
Filed under: Budget, In The News, Media Hits, Video, Waste | No Comments »
Posted on January 15, 2008 by Leslie Paige
This story in the Hill is stuffed with fantastic comments and quotes about the possibility that President Bush might take an ax to earmarks by using an executive order. Here are a couple of whoppers:
A spokesman for Senate Appropriations Chairman Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.) accused the Bush administration of hypocrisy for considering an executive order telling federal [...]
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Earmarks, In The News, Pork, Reform, Waste | No Comments »
Posted on January 8, 2008 by Leslie Paige
Today’s WSJ Online has a wonderful editorial on anti-earmark hero Rep. Jeff Flake’s bid to fill a vacant seat on, of all places, the House Appropriations Committee! Here it is (in its entirety):
REVIEW & OUTLOOK
The Anti-Appropriator
January 8, 2008; Page A20
We’re suckers for lost causes, so we’re pleased to report that Jeff Flake of Arizona is making a run for [...]
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Posted on January 4, 2008 by Leslie Paige
The word around here is that the President is still mulling his options and that he could still sign an executive order nullifying the earmarks contained in the conference report attached to massive omnibus spending bill which he signed into law in December.
CAGW wrote a letter yesterday to OMB Director Jim Nussle urging the White [...]
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Earmarks, Pig Book, Pork, Reform | 1 Comment »
Posted on January 2, 2008 by Leslie Paige
Using the database that our friends at the Heritage Foundation created, we counted up the number of earmarks requested by presidential candidates who have served in Congress. There are some eye-popping numbers in this list….especially that first one:
An examination of the Heritage Foundation’s database of the earmarks in the fiscal 2008 omnibus appropriations bill revealed the total number received by Presidential [...]
Filed under: Budget, Earmarks, In The News, Pig Book, Pork | 1 Comment »
Posted on December 29, 2007 by Leslie Paige
On December 28th, Presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee held a conference call with bloggers. Our friend Robert Bluey over at the Heritage Foundation made good use of our recent release on the candidates’ ratings and asked Gov. Huckabee about what he would do about the epidemic of earmarks. Robert shared the exchange with us, so here it is:
Robert Bluey Question: Governor, [...]
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Earmarks, Pig Book, Pork, Reform | 1 Comment »
Posted on December 24, 2007 by Leslie Paige
Below is the full text of the letter that CAGW, along with 19 other fiscal watchdog groups sent to President Bush asking him to use an executive order to strike all the more than 9000 earmarks from that abysmal omnibus spending bill that passed right before everyone scattered to celebrate the holidays:
Mr. President:
This past week, Congress passed [...]
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Posted on December 19, 2007 by Alexa Moutevelis
Search through earmarks in the Omnibus here and comment on the juiciest ones you find on the Swine Line blog!
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Earmarks, Pork | No Comments »
Posted on December 18, 2007 by Alexa Moutevelis
Watch Tom Schatz discuss the Omnibus and Farm Bill as well as announce December’s Porker of the Month on CNBC’s Pork Watch
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Earmarks, Farm Bill, In The News, Media Hits, Pork, Porker | No Comments »
Posted on December 18, 2007 by Alexa Moutevelis
Nearly 9,000 Earmark Requests in Omnibus
“It’s totally fiscally irresponsible to lump everything together in one spending bill and put it to a vote less than 24 hours later,” said David Williams, vice president of policy for Citizens Against Government Waste.
“It doesn’t have to be this way. They had all year to do this. It’s like [...]
Filed under: Appropriations, Budget, Earmarks, In The News, Media Hits, Pork | No Comments »
Posted on December 14, 2007 by Alexa Moutevelis
Heritage has a great breakdown of the budget deal:
Spending Hikes: A Guide to the Gimmicks
Good football teams use misdirection–because it works. One trick is to fake a quarterback kneel-down in the last seconds of a half, then throw long. The same trickery happens in politics. As this year’s Congress winds down, Democrats have announced they [...]
Filed under: Budget, In The News | No Comments »
