That's An Earmark, John

"I can eliminate $100 billion of wasteful and earmark spending immediately--35 billion in big spending bills in the last two years, and another 65 billion that has already been made a permanent part of the budget."
--John McCain, NPR All Things Considered, April 23, 2008.

Now it’s the E word. Remember when they used to attack us by using the L word? I haven’t heard that one much this campaign. Yes, the earmark. A really baaaaaaaad thing. Wasteful government spending—money given to special interests—pork barrel projects in someone’s home District. Did they ever think about the fact that all government spending is in someone’s home District? Probably not. Senator McCain has tried to make earmarks a campaign issues—says he’s going to eliminate them. President Bush has said the same thing. When did they find Jesus?--it was the Republican Party that made securing earmarks an art form.

Earmarks, even with all of their political value in bashing the spending habits of the Congress, still make up less than 1% of the federal budget. Someone should point out to Senator McCain that Arizona, his home state, has water because of government spending—and infrastructure, too. Earmarks are not the dreadful budget breaker he would like you to think they are. Earmarks are nothing more than targeted government spending.

In the past six years, Congressman Tim Ryan of the 17th Congressional District of Ohio has brought back millions of dollars in federal earmarks, and he makes no excuses. He will tell you that for too long the District was sending dollars elsewhere—so now it’s time to get them back. Let me give you some examples from the Youngstown area of earmarks secured in the last six years by Mr. Ryan. Earmarks secured by the Congressman will renovate classroom space at the Ravenna Arsenal for use by the Ohio National Guard. A separate earmark will provide sewer and water lines to the Arsenal. The Congressman has secured earmarks that will build barracks at the Youngstown Air Reserve Station and money has already been provided to upgrades to the Aerial Spray Unit at the base, the only fixed wing spray unit in the Air Force. Earmarks have been provided to do research at Youngstown State University, fund education programs at Beatitude House, build high technology visors for our military, and made available the funding to do research and build a feeding tube used by the U.S. Army. Money has been provided to build water and sewer lines in Liberty Township and Brookfield and road construction in more places than can be listed. That is only a small portion of all of the money secured by the Congressman.

When someone tells you that we need to do away with earmarks because they are wasteful, refer them to the list above. And when Senator McCain comes back to town and drives by the Veterans’ Memorial in Struthers, and he asks where the money came from to build it, you tell him, “That’s an earmark, John.”