Waking up on a beautiful spring day, I was looking for equally bright news in the media.  Instead, I found today’s op-ed in the Washington Post by Colbert King which shows that earmarks know no boundaries.  He cites millions of dollars in projects that were included in the District of Columbia’s budget that King says were “initiated and approved by the [city] council without extensive executive branch review.”   They include several theaters, the Washington Opera, and the National Building Museum.  If those projects sound familiar, it is due to the fact that Citizens Against Government Waste has found thousands of similar expenditures over the years in its Congressional Pig Book.  CAGW has also exposed such projects at the state level, most recently in the 2008 Illinois Piglet Book and the 2008 Tennessee Pork Report.  Those of us who live in the District of Columbia have the fourth latest Tax Freedom Day in the nation, according to The Tax Foundation.  At least the weather is great today…

THe Hill newspaper reports on items stuck into what is supposed to be a WAR bill.

Senate panel approves Iraq war funding bill

A number of Republicans have joined Democrats in pushing to beef up the domestic spending in the supplemental measure, recognizing that the must-pass bill remains one of the few pieces of legislation likely to become law before November’s elections.

Still, the committee added some controversial provisions that could cost Democrats some GOP support and votes from the conservative wing of their caucus.

For instance, Congress including in the domestic-programs amendment a provision that would help pave the way for undocumented agriculture workers to win legal status, an amendment that could reopen Congress’ rancorous debate over immigration policy. …

Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, a conservative Democrat who voted against the Feinstein-Craig amendment, said it raises a “red flag.” …

Other immigration measures were added as well, including one by Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), who sought a three-year extension on a returning worker provision under H-2B visas, which she said was necessary to save seasonal businesses like seafood companies. That amendment has the support of Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.).

“It could be the end of crab meat,” she warned if the amendment were to be rejected. It was added to the Iraq-funding portion of the bill.

By a 20-9 vote, the committee also approved an amendment by Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) to increase low-income heating assistance by $1 billion.

The move prompted the ranking member of the committee, Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), to warn that a slew of amendments that were being added could lead to a White House veto.

“I think we are getting carried away here with the ease with which we are running up the bill,” Cochran said. “We’re turning this bill into a huge bill to force the administration to veto it.”

But Cochran and a number of other Republicans are strongly supportive of many other domestic spending items in the bill. Cochran, for instance, backs $10.4 billion for Gulf Coast recovery from the 2005 hurricanes Katrina and Rita. A number of centrist Republicans and ones in tough races support a 13-week extension of unemployment insurance, 11 Republicans are co-sponsoring a provision by Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.) to expand educational benefits for veterans, many support a plan to delay seven Medicaid rules issued by the Bush administration and $400 million of the so-called Byrne grants for state and local law enforcement remains very popular with both parties. …

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) won adoption of $50 million for an amendment to fund the Adam Walsh Act, a law aimed at tracking unregistered sex offenders. And Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) won adoption of a $100 million amendment to boost border security.

What are these items doing in a WAR SUPPLEMENTAL?!

Emergency spending is basically a giant loophole.  The costs of supplemental bills are not counted in official annual budget figures, but still get added to the national debt.  The projects and programs slipped into supplementals often would not pass muster in the regular budget process.  Presidents are historically reluctant to veto funding meant for the troops, which makes such bills a magnet for pork; President Bush has threatened to veto this year’s bill.

As if complaining about the $5.2 billion in direct subsidy payments to millionaire farmers and $3.8 billion in disaster aid that will ultimately hurt taxpayers and the environment wasn’t enough, at the very last minute Congress added more than $2 billion in earmarks to the Farm Bill.

The complete list is here (Farm Bill Earmarks), but let me list a few of my personal favorites, that somehow didn’t make the list:

-$500 million for the Qualified Forestry Bonds Program.  This program was added to the Farm Bill to benefit one company, the Plum Creek Timber Company.

-$170 million for distressed salmon fishermen in California, Oregon and Washington.  Maybe they just need a good therapist.

-The Equine Equity Act.  According to Sen. McConnell (R-Ky.), “My legislation will remove the unfair tax burden on horses that discourage investment in the horse industry.”

There you have it.   A Congress riddled with scandal still thinks it is accepatble to earmark money for dubious projects.

Here is a link to the most recent GAO review of weak governance and mismanagement issues that have been dogging one of America’s great cultural institutions, the Smithsonian.  Hey, unless you are Hercules, it ain’t easy to muck out the Augean stables in a single day.

Sen. Charles “Chuck” Schumer (D-N.Y.)

Washington Office:
Phone: 202-224-6542
Fax: 202-228-3027

http://schumer.senate.gov/
Email Form

CAGW Names Sen. Charles Schumer Porker of the Month 

CCAGW Statement Submitted for the Record before the House Armed Services Committee

Committee Mark-Up of H.R. 5658, The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2009

May 14, 2008

According to the May 2 Congressional Quarterly, some members of the House Armed Services Committee are considering challenging the Air Force’s $35 billion contract award to Northrop Grumman for its new generation of refueling tankers to force a reopening of bids. Currently, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) is undertaking a review of the contract award process in response to Boeing’s protest. The GAO has until June 19 to issue its decision. On behalf of the more than 1.2 million members and supporters of the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste (CCAGW), the committee should oppose any efforts to scuttle the Air Force’s tanker contract while the GAO is undertaking its review.

CCAGW has been interested in the Air Force refueling tanker debate ever since a $3,000,000 earmark was inserted into the fiscal 2003 Defense Appropriations Act for the no-bid tanker lease program. The earmark won the CCAGW 2003 Congressional Pig Book Oinker, “The Taxpayers Get Tanked Award.” Taxpayers remember that this project became one of the worst examples of corporate welfare and eventually ballooned into a major scandal. The Air Force’s chief negotiator on the tanker contract and Boeing’s number-two corporate officer went to jail and Boeing was fined more than $600 million.

The Air Force undertook a competitive bid process in 2006 and two companies, Boeing and Northrop Grumman, submitted proposals. Just before the announcement of the contract winner in 2008, both sides stated that the competition had been fair and transparent. But on February 29, 2008, the Air Force awarded the contract to Northrop Grumman and suddenly the political environment changed in Washington, D.C. Now supporters of Boeing have accused the Air Force of using unreliable foreign suppliers to build the tanker, have expressed angst that jobs would go overseas, and argued that national security would be compromised. They continue to ignore the fact that Boeing’s planes contain foreign parts, including some manufactured in China and Japan. The Northrop Grumman plane, in partnership with the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company, will be built in Alabama and security issues will be handled by the Defense Department inside Northrop Grumman facilities.

CCAGW believes that Congressional interference with the tanker acquisition process sets a bad example. Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics John Young said in an April 18, Seattle Post Intelligencer article that actions by some House members to simply override the Air Force’s decision “would open up slippery slopes and dangerous precedents.” He pointed out that if lawmakers are successful in obstructing funding for the tanker contract that was won by Northrop Grumman, it would create serious problems and more Congressional interference in federal contracting. Young stated, “Do we have the California delegation kill a program because the Georgia delegation won? I don’t know where this stops.” We agree with Young’s statement, “If I am going to demand that certain companies or proposals must win regardless of what they cost, I am going to disadvantage the taxpayer and war fighter. I am going to deliver (a weapon with) less capability for more cost.”

On April 21, while speaking at the Air War College in Maxwell, Alabama, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said, “All I can say is that I think it would be a real shame if the tankers were to get delayed. We are long past due in terms of getting on with this program.” Secretary Gates added, “Based on everything I’ve seen this was a fair process but we’ll wait and see what the GAO report says.”

The House Armed Services Committee should follow Secretary Gates’ advice and oppose any efforts to reverse or stop the tanker contract before the GAO issues its report. Furthermore, if the GAO delivers a clean bill of health for the process, members of Congress should abandon further efforts to overturn the Air Force’s contract award.

The Hill newspaper reports that the infamous $23 million NDIC earmark, over which 2007 Porker of the Year winner John Murtha threw a temper tantrum and threatened a colleague last year, was removed from this year’s intelligence bill:

Dems, GOP together nix Murtha earmark

Democrats and Republicans joined together to strip a pet project of Rep. John Murtha’s (D-Pa.) from the 2009 intelligence authorization bill — the same project Democrats defended last year.

The Murtha earmark, $23 million for the National Drug Intelligence Center (NDIC), was one of a handful of pet projects eliminated from the bill in a lopsided 17-4 vote. Several Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee joined with Republicans to support the amendment, which was sponsored by Rep. Pete Hoekstra (Mich.), the panel’s ranking Republican.

…Most Democrats supported the move to keep the bill earmark-free, an outcome that surprised and encouraged Hoekstra.

“I was a little surprised,” he said. “I had thought the majority was going to say, ‘No, we’re keeping our earmarks.’

“This bill should be about our national security priorities,” he continued. “The best way to give confidence to the American people in this bill, which is largely kept out of public view, is to focus on our national security priorities not something that’s being driven by member requests.”

Hoekstra said Democrats’ decision to join his amendment could be a sign that other appropriations and authorizations bills this year could be earmark-free as well.

What a sorry excuse for leadership! On Thursday, May 8, 2008, Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) and Rep. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.), Chairmen of the Senate and House Agriculture Committees respectively, had spent more than an hour revealing their conference agreement on H.R. 2419, the 2008 Farm Bill. Understandably, since they had shepherded this monstrosity to conclusion, they spent much time extolling the virtues of the legislation, even claiming that it was the most reform-minded farm bill in history.Toward the end of the press conference, in response to a question related to direct payments, Peterson said that there is no justification for continuing direct payments and that they should be replaced by a better safety net. Harkin chimed in that in fact these payments were created as transitional payments that were supposed to be phased out by 2003. Then, they indicated that they intend to start a dialogue with the farm groups that have opposed getting rid of these payments.

Wait a minute! Where have they been? Aren’t these the two guys in Congress most responsible for providing leadership on formulating farm policy? Shouldn’t they have started that dialogue two years ago instead of thinking about it now when they are on the verge of sending a bill to the President?

For the last two years, a whole host of taxpayer, environmental, conservation, nutrition and faith-based groups have argued that there is no justification for continuing direct payments. They amount to $5.2 billion annually, go to individuals (many of whom are no longer farming) without regard to prices or income, with 60 percent of the payments going to the wealthiest 10 percent of recipients.

If Harkin and Peterson really believe that direct payments are not justified, then they have demonstrated that they are abysmal failures at leadership. But, I think they are just playing a little game. They want us to go along with this disastrous farm bill in exchange for the far distant hope that more reform will come in five years.

It is time to end the charade. While chances don’t look good to defeat the conference report in either the House or the Senate, it does look like we can trust the President to veto this disastrous legislation. Hopefully, his veto will be sustained and Harkin and Peterson can be sent back to the drawing board. Now that we know that they supposedly want to get rid of these direct payments, maybe they can provide a little leadership and get it right the next time.

It’s that time of the year again - time to load up the “Emergency” War Supplemental.  The hijinx are in full swing with billions of dollars being diverted from a bill that is supposed to go to the troops in the battlefield:

Roll Call: Supplemental Roils Congress

Despite pressure from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to keep the measure narrowly focused, Senate Appropriations Chairman Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.) plans to offer his domestic spending package that would include almost $4.6 billion in relief for Hurricane Katrina and other natural disasters, $1.2 billion for science programs, about $450 million for highway repairs and hundreds of millions more for food safety and local law enforcement grants, to name a few.

..“I am sure that appropriators are aware that loading this up like a Christmas tree could put us in a difficult situation with the House [and] the White House, as well as being a PR nightmare,” said one senior Senate Democratic aide.

Still, in question is whether Senate Democratic appropriators will seek to add even more domestic spending at the panel’s markup today.

“There will be some things added. There’s no question about it,” said Appropriations member Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.). “It’s a question of how many and what conditions will there be during the markup, unless there’s a decision made that nothing gets added, which I can’t imagine.”

Hang onto your wallets, AGAIN.  The House passed legislation today, an amendment to H.R. 3221, the Foreclosure Prevention Act, by a vote of 266 to 154, that will bail out irresponsible lenders, speculators, and people that committed fraud for home purchases and are now in financial trouble.  Here is a video by Rep. Tom Feeney (R-Florida) who speaks about people — like you and me — that pay their mortgage and rent on time but will now will foot the $300 billion price tag to “fix” the subprime mortgage crisis.

An earlier bill, H.R. 5818, The Neighborhood Stabilization Act, introduced by Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), passed by a vote of 239 to 188.  This legislation would authorize $15 billion in loans and grants for states to buy and rehabilitate foreclosed properties.  We opposed this legislation because this was a handout to lenders.  After all, the houses are already foreclosed.  In addition, it would provide grants to leftie housing advocacy groups.

Unfortunately, these bills will do nothing to fix the subprime mortgage crisis, in fact the market is already taking care of that.  If anything, they could prolong the crisis.  Just what we need, more Congressional meddling in the economy.

The President has threatened to veto the legislation.  Let’s hope he does and fiscally responsible Members of Congress sustain the veto.