So Much for Pork Reform

Not that I was expecting any spending reform, but the Demospratic screeching for reform seems to have gotten the amount that I expected. Essentially none at all.

The final version worked out to about $742 million a page. Brian M. Riedl, a fellow on budgetary issues at the conservative Heritage Foundation, wrote recently that the bill “could be the most expensive emergency legislation in American history.”

Just what is all this stuff? You can read the details for yourself on the 87-page printout, or nosh on this Top 10:

--$165,200 to the widow of Rep. Charles Norwood (R-Ga.), a promoter of patients’ rights legislation who died of cancer and lung disease in February, three months after he was reelected.

--$4 million for the Office of Women's Health at the Food and Drug Administration.

--$5 million for tropical fish breeders and transporters for losses from a virus last year.

--$25 million for spinach that growers and handlers were unable to market, up to 75 percent of their losses.

--$50 million “for asbestos abatement and other improvements” to the Capitol Power Plant.

--$60.4 million for the National Marine Fisheries Service, “to be distributed among fishing communities, Indian tribes, individuals, small businesses, including fishermen, fish processors, and related businesses, and other persons for assistance to mitigate the economic and other social effects caused by” a commercial fishery failure.

--$74 million “for the payment of storage, handling, and other associated costs for the 2007 crop of peanuts to ensure proper storage of peanuts for which a loan is made.”

--$120 million for the shrimp and menhaden fishing industries to cover consequences of Hurricane Katrina.

--$283 million for the Milk Income Loss Contract Program.

--$400 million for “wildland fire suppression.”

So much for a clean bill. You'd think the Dems would want to minimize the reasons that will make this bill a non-starter in the senate and a certainty for veto by the president. Especially if they are determined to make this about ending the war. Seeing that the bill has to many payoffs to various Dems to get their votes, I'm guessing this is more of the usual political bull shit.

I love this bit of argument:

House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) contended that while some (although certainly not all) of the items have merit, they have no business in an emergency war spending bill and should be considered through the normal appropriations process. Kevin Smith, Boehner's communications director, said: "Republicans insisted on a clean war-spending bill last year, free from pork. We don't think it's asking too much from Democrats to focus on our troops first and consider the needs of spinach farmers and tropical fish later in the year."

Sarah Feinberg, communications director for the House Democratic Caucus, replied: “It’s a disingenuous argument being made by the very same members of Congress who were wholly incapable of producing legislation last year that would meet the needs of those farmers and veterans who are so desperate for assistance now. For Democrats, being in the majority sometimes means cleaning up the messes of the Republicans who came before us. If Republicans felt so strongly, one would expect them to make some attempt on the floor to take the spending out. Instead they chose to bluster.”

Boehner's comment is correct, even if hypocritical from how the Repugs have been running the legislature. As for Feinberg's statement, she appears to have forgotten that the Dems promised in an exceptionally shrill tone during the elections, and now to completely ignore those promises is truly telling. And as for cleaning up republican's messes, what a surprise that she would be blaming issues on the Repubs and then argue that they could have attempted to change the bill. If the republican's messes exist, what did the dems do to fix them other than provide obstructions? It's just wonderful to see each group blaming the other, and not taking any responsibility for their own part of the "mess."

Again we see another reason why a third party is really needed and what really is broken in Washington.