And this is why making ‘earmarks’ a bad thing works against the Republicans. And why Obama is going to work this ‘no earmarks’ thing as hard as he possibly can. Makes perfect sense to me.
Maybe we are talking passed each other somewhere.
If this were the case then there would literally be no such thing as “earmarks” since the use of every dime of federal money that goes to the state would be determined by their congresscritter. Hence, no earmarks since the use of every cent is being explicitly spelled out anyway.
Doubtless some things the money is spent on I would be cool with.
In the larger picture though I dislike the implicit corruption surrounding it. Perhaps there are occasions where it is something that is really needed and it is altruism all around. Most times it is a way to buy votes or woo donors to your campaign.
I’m not understanding what you are saying here.
Agencies develop a budget, which the President approves of and it is sent to Congress. Those proposals can be modified by Congress as much as Congress wishes. Sometimes, Congress may say, we agree with funding x as you requested, we want to do y at this location, and we do not approve of z. Agencies then carry out x and y, but there are roughly 110 times more x’s than y’s.
If you want to say there should be no more y’s, then you have to explain why we should trust federal agencies to make the right decisions when it comes to things like preventing flooding in St. Louis. If federal agencies had their way, and Congress could not add money for programs it thinks is important, then there would have been $1.2 billion in damage to St. Louis. That was averted because of a $20 million earmark.
I am asking for you to distinguish an earmark from the usual budget process and how money is allocated to various projects.
As to why we should “trust” federal agencies you just said the agencies make the vast majority of the decisions (110x more in your example). If we shouldn’t trust them we shouldn’t allow them to make any decisions and have congress hand them a list that congress figured out since congress knows best.
I am not opposed to Missouri wanting to earmark money for flood control. I said I wish the earmark had to get a distinct vote of its own. Seems to me earmarking money for flood control is something a congressperson could happily stand behind and put up for a vote. Many earmarks are requested by numerous congresspersons. Those should breeze through too.
Indeed if Obama stands by his promise to veto anything with an earmark in it I would guess that is precisely what congress will have to do (or override his veto).
That or give the president a line-item veto (I know…won’t happen without a constitutional amendment).
I’m afraid I don’t understand what is unclear. I’ve summarized the budget process twice. Agencies develop a budget, which is sent to Congress. The proposals are turned into bills. If Congress wants to do something that wasn’t included in the agency proposal, and puts it in a funding bill, it is probably an earmark. Once a bill is passed that funds both agency proposals and earmarks, the agencies are charged with implementing those funding decisions.
Strawman. Nobody is proposing stripping agencies of the ability to develop budgets. The only point of controversy is whether Congress should be allowed to say, “We support 99.3% of what you proposed, but there is .7% of the budget which we think should be allocated to things we think are important that you didn’t include in your proposal. We changed your priorities slightly to fund these projects, and these changes are called earmarks.”
Nobody is disputing that agencies develop budget proposals that are generally reflective of the priorities of the President and Congress. But agencies do not develop budgets that are PERFECT reflections of the priorities of the President and Congress, so I say Congress should be able to make modifications – including adding funds for things it thinks are important.
It is just simply impossible to get a vote on every earmark. It simply cannot be done. Each year, each house of Congress has about 400-600 votes on bills, amendments, and motions. Even if earmarks were cut back to a couple hundred per year, you are proposing to double the number of votes that Congress has. That would mean that Congress simply couldn’t conduct other business, such as debate or hearings, because they’d be busy voting all the time. It is simply impossible, no more so than ordering a factory worker to produce twice as many widgets within his 40 hour workweek.
Fair enough.
Citizens Against Government Waste has a pretty good list of criteria for earmarks that seem questionable:
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Requested by only one chamber of Congress;
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Not specifically authorized;
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Not competitively awarded;
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Not requested by the President;
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Greatly exceeds the President’s budget request or the previous year’s funding;
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Not the subject of congressional hearings; or
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Serves only a local or special interest.
Not sure how you could implement the last one (as in define it as a rule for congress to follow) but I think the others could be managed.
If a given earmark meets one of the above criteria it needs to get its own vote.
That should cut down the number to be voted on to manageable levels as well as putting the brakes on the egregious stuff.
It is impossible, as I have already said. The number of earmarks is roughly in the many thousands, and they pretty much meet that criteria. Even if you cut the number by 10 times, it is still impossible to vote on them.
And you have to maintain perspective on this: there are many hundreds of thousands of programs requested by the President that are not specifically authorized, not subject to hearings, serve primarily a localized interest, and some percentage of those are not competitively awarded. Why is it that if an agency program meets the criteria you listed (with the exception of not being requested by the President), it’s assumed to be okay, but if an earmark also meets the criteria, it is assumed to be bad?
You’re not laboring under the naive impression that the President doesn’t hand out political favors in his budget, are you?
The bureaucrat.
I disagree. I am looking at a list of them now (it is in a spreadsheet and now I can’t find the link but will try harder to find it if you really want) and lots would pass muster per that criteria.
Additionally, given known criteria, congresscritters would try harder to do what is necessary to pass muster (e.g. getting someone in the other House to support it). What would be left would be manageable.
This is beside the point though. We can nitpick details all day. Suffice it to say I reject your stance that “this is just how it works, nothing to be done about it” attitude. Republicans and democrats alike have noted in the past how the process can be abused and produce undesirable results. I prefer to think a solution exists that would minimize those undesireable results. Whether it is what I suggested above or something else.
I have no expectation that Congress would limit itself however and do not expect anything to change. They did try to give the president a line-item veto and got taken to court and lost so that solution is out (it would be the best solution by far).
Citizens Against Government Waste lists 9,129 earmarks in 2010. Again, I just don’t think you understand a number of the basic facts in this debate.
Lots of things COULD be done about it. I’m saying that the power of Congress to fund projects not requested by the President shouldn’t be eliminated.
The thing is, agencies also abuse the laws regarding government procurement. Nobody would dare suggest that agencies not be allowed to develop budget proposals. The last Chief of Staff of the Air Force was fired for violating contracting rules. The abuse of the budgetary process by members of Congress should be treated in the same way as abuse of the budgetary process by members of the Executive Branch: prosecute for wrongdoing. But the answer isn’t to strip either branch of government from its ability to put priorities in the budget. That’s an overreaction that is, I believe, against the letter and intent of the Constitution.
I saw it just fine (although the list I was looking at was 6,000 or so, not sure what the difference is but still a lot). As mentioned a great many already are “fine” with multiple people signed on, often from both houses and so on. I would think were rules in place demanding that you’d see congresspeople work to get someone else on board to meet the criteria they need to meet. Some things they may not bother. What is left should be manageable.
Again though I am not here to nitpick particular solutions (and I am not surprised some things I proposed have major flaws). I am merely advocating that changes should be made. We can argue in another thread if you want about specific changes but barring congress actually working on proposals to change the earmark system to make it topical I am not sure what value it would have argue it now.
Good thing I didn’t say it should be eliminated either. I would like to see some improvements to the system, not dump it.
There will always be inefficiencies and abuse. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t seek to minimize it and catch it when it occurs. As it stands people catch the abuse all the time as regards earmarks but that is the legal way it is done so the abuse continues with the knock-on effects of the corruption implicit in some of it.
Well, in general, I agree. I’m just not sure why banning earmarks seems to be a Republican position (until Obama’s WTF moment). On further thought, it’s not even a Republican position, it’s a tea party position, and that’s even more odd – why would someone with a tea party outlook want some egghead in Washington making decisions for their district?
Is the whole earmark “controversy” just a way to distract the populace and pretend to be fiscally responsible when it’s no such thing? Probably, I guess. Sigh.
Quoth Whack-a-Mole:
A line-item veto wouldn’t solve anything. Who defines what’s a line or item? If it’s the Congress, then we’ll just get line-items that look like “Item 7963: 10 billion dollars will be allocated for orphan relief for the victims of Hurricane Katrina and 6 million dollars will be allocated for the Unemployed Street-Sweepers Memorial Museum in Representative Cheatham’s district. Item 7964: …”, and nothing will have changed. If it’s the President who defines what an “item” is, then we’ll get presidents vetoing out the word “not” and signing the rest of the bill, giving the President basically unlimited power.
Err…
I am not up on the specifics of how, exactly, a line-item veto works but I would note that 43 state governors have a line-item veto and the US Congress gave the president the line-item veto in 1996 (which was short lived due to a legal challenge).
Apparently no one has obtained unlimited power from this yet nor have legislatures taken to obfuscating what money is for.