Posted on 04/29/2010 5:10:28 AM PDT by Patriot1259
Each year, Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) releases its annual report of government pork barrel spending and this year is no exception. This week, the organization released its 2010 "Congressional Pig Book," which comes during the group's 20th anniversary. As in past issues, the focus is on spending that is out of control. The Pig Book exposes 9,129 earmarks that combined are worth $16.5 billion.
What, exactly, is an "earmark?" The simplest and most concise definition I have seen on the subject comes from FactCheck.org, which describes earmarks as "government funds that are allocated by a legislator for a particular pet project, often without proper review." Spending bills are often full of politically unpopular items and in order to get them passed, they include nasty little pet projects that are designed to make the larger bill more palpable to individual members of Congress in both Houses and parties. According to CAGW, slightly more than 15 percent of earmarks went to Republican members, the remainder went to the Democrats. Considering that the GOP pretends to be the only party with a moral high ground on this issue, this number is still too high.
(Excerpt) Read more at thecypresstimes.com ...
Shocking!
I love the idea of the Pig Book and CAGW, but why doesn’t anything HAPPEN as a result of the information being exposed?
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