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I would love to see the Republican Party try to remove the progenitor of the Tea Party movement from all his committees. They should really take a stand and do that, it’ll do wonders for the 2010 elections.
According to the New Orleans Times-Picayune, Reps. Anh “Joseph” Cao of Louisiana and Ron Paul of Texas have joined Rep. Don Young (AK) in requesting earmarks for the 2011 fiscal year, despite a House Republican caucus vote this month to institute a moratorium on earmarks for one year.
Those members’ committee assignments could be on the line, according to a spokesman for House Minority Leader John Boehner.
“The Leaders expect all House Republican members to comply with the moratorium,” the spokesman, Michael Steel, said in an email. “There will be situations where we have some confusion on how these rules are implemented, but if Members are deliberately breaking the rules, it will be a serious matter and one that the Steering Committee will consider.”
I cannot wait for the word back to the Tea Party community that Ron Paul just got tossed off of all his committees. I’m sure that would energize this new base.
The thing is, if you listen to Paul’s spokesman, he’s pretty much right on this issue:
Paul spokeswoman Rachel Mills said he thinks Washington already extracts too much money from his constituents, and “part of his job is to work hard in Washington, D.C., to get that money back to those constituents in any form that he can.” She said Paul also believes that earmarking is more transparent than the regular budget process because you know exactly where the money goes and that it doesn’t affect the total amount appropriated by one dime.
Yes, this conflicts with libertarian ideology in part, but not in the whole. I don’t think almost any attention should be paid to the ridiculous earmark issue, which accounts for around 1% of the federal budget. But to the extent there is attention, Paul is correct. No earmark affects total appropriations. And failing to earmark does leave appropriations up to the federal government and the related executive agencies to determine where the money goes. You can see a list of Paul’s earmark requests here.
The entire drama over earmarks is silly, so if it results in Ron Paul losing committee assignments and the GOP leadership having to explain that and have this debate, all the better.
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Amazing how the Democrats can’t figure out how to do this to traitorous scumbags like Lieberwhore…
Yep.
This is a big story I think. The R’s can organize their committees any which way. But tradition and fairness says that Paul deserves his committee assignments. I disagree with much of what Paul supports. But he is savvy politically and he is no Villager. What’s the deal? Can you say: Audit the Fed. Can you say Goldman Sachs?
The teabaggers will know how to feel abouit this as soon as Rush tells them.
Sorry, but the earmark issue is neither silly nor ridiculous. Just ask those associated with Abramoff.
Ron Paul has a lot of armed fans. He also has a lot of wealthy ones. The Republicans aren’t going to do anything but grant him his earmarks. The RNC can’t take another hit to their fundraising.
Did you hear that? McCain’s head just exploded.
Earmarks are not unimportant, they are very important because they are consistently used over and over by Republicans in the elections. Earmarks have always been a problem, and they should be eliminated.
Speaking of Heads Exploding, look at this little goody mcjoan just put up front page at DKOS:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/4/1/853166/-How-Insurers-Can-Game-the-New-System
Does anybody else think it’s funny that OrangeMan Boehner’s spokesperson’s name is Michael Steel with only two e’s?
This is an important issue. Earmarks as a concept are not bad except that there are currently no rules other than barring earmarks to Members of Congress and their family regulating who the Members can provide an earmark to. This can and does lead to Members using this taxpayer money as their personal bank for contributors, friends etc.
The problem with earmarks is that there is a disjoint between the representatives who vote for them, and lobbying efforts. I personally think earmarks are conceptually a good idea. They can provide clear measures of accountability to government departments. It makes sure that departmental responsibilites are met at an appropriate cost.
The big problem is when these earmarks are not in the best interests of the country. The recent examples of the unrequested military aircraft earmarks were to keep the plants building them open (instead of being retooled to build something actually necessary), and most certainly to keep money flowing to the military contractors providing them. No doubt there were campaign contributions (aka bribes) to prod the representatives.
Bitter bitter queens, I tell ya.
Whoa, I got a little whiplash. You hate him…and yet, he’s right. Hmmm.
Earmarks are a 1% issue that won’t reduce spending one dime if it is eliminated.
Way to keep it classy (not).
Paul is batshit when you look at him closely. He wants to privatize California’s beaches. He seems progressive on the issues, but would really like to abolish government altogether. If Paul was here in the late 1700′s his undertaker’s great great great, (etc) grandparents would still be trying to remove the tar and feathers from his corpse.
“Earmarks is the responsibility of the Congress. We should earmark even more. We should earmark every penny. So, that’s the principle that we have to follow and the — and the responsibility of the Congress. The whole idea that you vote against an earmark, you don’t save a penny. That just goes to the administration and they get to allocate the funds.”
Earmarks have been defined as “evil, greed, and other MSM new terms for it” but actually earmarks allows the American people to know where their taxed are going. The funds are already appropriated, it’s not like we will have to pay less taxes, it’s just that when it’s not earmarked the American people don’t know where their money is going. Then the administration can do with the money as they please without the American people knowing where it’s going.
Nice smear.
The great thing about earmarks is they are “out there” for all to see. If there is graft and corruption involved, it is totally transparent. The bad thing about handing the administration a lump sum and telling them to spend it anyway they want is that there is virtually no transparency.
Congress can always say NO to an earmark if they choose to. They cannot say anything to the President once the lump sum has been approved. Remember the first TARP bailout? Congress handed the Bush administration a blank check for $700 billion with the understanding the Treasury would spend it to buy “distressed assets” from the banks. Within a couple of days of the money being approved by Congress WITHOUT EARMARKS the Treasury Department changed their minds. We still don’t know where all of it went.
to many people here still don’t understand what an earmark is so let me explain so even a moron can get it.
Let’s say you and your college buddies are hanging out in your mom’s basement playing some D&D. It’s getting late, and everyone is getting hungry. Ronnie says he doesn’t want to get dinner, since he brought a hoagie, but everyone else wants to order pizza. Ron is outvoted and they decide to order pizza.
When it comes time to order, the gang collects they money from everyone, including Ron. Ron says he brought food, so he didn’t think he should pay. Tough luck, Ron… we all voted, and you’re paying. “Fine,” says Ron, “But I want a white pizza with onions.”
“Wait, you said you didn’t want pizza! Are you going to be having pizza with us now? Isn’t that a bit hypocritical?”
“Well, I voted to not get pizza, but since you already have my money, and there’s nothing I can do about that, I might as well state my preference for the pizza that comes. It’s the only way I’m going to get the best use out of the money I’ve lost. I’d much rather keep the money and not have the pizza, but to avoid the pizza out of principle is simply cheating myself.”