Earmark Requests Continue Despite Promises to Curb Process

Wall Street Journal ^ | July 16, 2009 | Jake Sherman

[jazusamo]

WASHINGTON -- Despite cries for reform, the earmark process is alive and well in Congress.

As lawmakers write the military budget for fiscal-year 2010, every member on the House defense-appropriations subcommittee has requested funds for contractors and other organizations with employees who have donated money to their campaigns.

The 18 members of the subcommittee are seeking a total of about $2 billion on behalf of such companies, universities and nonprofit groups, according to a review of campaign-finance data and nearly 400 earmark requests in the 2010 defense-spending bill by the nonpartisan Taxpayers for Common Sense.

Employees of those entities donated nearly $1 million to the 11 Democrats and seven Republicans since the beginning of 2007.

The defense-spending bill for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1, which will likely total more than $500 billion, is slated for a final vote in the panel Thursday.

The requests come as the Democratic-led Congress has vowed to curb the earmark process, where members write into the budget a requirement that funds be spent in a specific way, rather than leaving those decisions to the discretion of government officials or competitive bidding. Scandals over earmarks for big donors paved the way for Republicans to lose control of Congress in 2006.

After that election, Democrats mandated that lawmakers list earmark requests on their Web sites for public review months before the spending bills are written and debated. Previously, earmarks were inserted into bills without much oversight.

It is not illegal for employees of companies to donate money to lawmakers who attempt to secure earmarks for the companies. There is no guarantee that any lawmaker's request will end up in the final budget, which is subject to full votes in the House and Senate...

[jazusamo]

Asked to comment on the donations, Austin Durrer, a spokesman for Mr. Moran, said: "Is there a rule against that?"

If Congress wanted to stop the corruption they'd pass a law making it illegal to award earmarks to private companies.

[exist]

It would be nice if Republicans would pledge to stop this— that way we could really go after the Dems on it.

[jazusamo]

Rep. Jeff Flake in the House has been outspoken on earmarks but he doesn’t have enough Repubs supporting him. Like you say, every Repub should and maybe they’d get somewhere.

[gathersnomoss]

Today's excuse for a Republican is just one step behind their breather en Democrats. Both have all but destroyed the country that I love, with few exceptions. The lack of fight by the Republicans is a disgrace to our forefathers. Of course, The Republicans and Rats only care about "their" jobs, while this country looses jobs by the hundreds of thousands every month. Time to hang them high.

[cranked]

“Obama: No earmarks for 2009.”
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/04/15/obama.earmarks/index.html

[jazusamo]

Zer0 bought a few of the votes that put him in office with that one, now that he’s in we’ll hear no more about it from him.

[jazusamo]

Please bump the Freepathon and donate if you haven’t done so!

[Quiller]

If Congress wanted to stop the corruption they'd pass a law making it illegal to award earmarks to private companies

1. Repeal the 17th Amendment. Take it back to state legislatures to appoint senators to the national congress.

2. Establish a baseline for congressional pay, and give the state legislatures the power to increase congressional pay on an annual basis, with established limits on 1 year, 2 year, 4 year, and 6 year averages. Do not allow legislators to vote on their own pay and perqs.

3. Establish maximum allowable administrative support for congressthings. For members of committees, provide a maximum allowable committee augment.

4. Require congressthings to report as income every dollar that goes to them, whether through congressional pay, speaking fees, "gifts" of goods or of services (maybe a "Gift Czar" to overview assessment of gift value?!), and of campaign donations.

5. Bar any bill before congress from including funds that are not in DIRECT support of that bill (maybe a "Common Sense Czar", since that seems to be lacking).

6. Require any bill before congress to be publicly posted for a minimum of 5 working days before being voted on.

(Oh that's right, 0 already made a promise like that, just as he promised that there would be no bills with earmarks, then that there would only be that ONE bill with earmarks, because it was so d@mned important, then, . . .

Well, where's the change? This president truly had the opportunity to call on Americans to make sacrifices to make the country a better place. But his promises to NOT do Washington business as usual have resulted in the same tawdry, greedy, grubby, underhanded cr@p that has gone before, if not worse.

[smoothsailing]

A defense contractor with ties to Congressman John Murtha (D-Pennsylvania) has been indicted in a massive kickback scheme.

 

Federal prosecutors have charged Richard Ianieri with taking $200,000 in kickbacks while he headed Coherent Systems International Corporation. Three others who worked for other defense contractors with ties to Murtha are scheduled for trial later this month in Florida. (More details)
 
The indictment of Ianieri represents the first charges leveled as a result of investigations into firms receiving defense earmarks -- many of which benefitted former aides and associates of Murtha.
 
Ken Boehm is chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center, which has looked into a number of questionable Murtha earmarks.
 
"These are crummy little firms. Many of them are located in Murtha's district. That's part of the game," he explains. "But if they have anything substantial to do, they sub it out to some real company and keep a big chunk for themselves. And out of that chunk they pay the political contributions that go hand-in-hand with this kind of operation."
 
Murtha, Boehm contends, is like the center of a target that prosecutors will not reach until they penetrate the outer layers of corruption.
 
"I think what's going to happen is we're seeing the outer ring of the target fall first. That's the corrupt little defense contractors who couldn't survive but for this sort of political connection," he says. "The next ring is going to be the lobbyists who act as the brokers between the contractors and the congressman."
 
Boehm believes the lobbyists should be in position to help prosecutors eventually get to Murtha.

 

Source--Murtha associate indicted for money scheme

[jazusamo]

Well said, I agree. Of course what should happen and what will are two very different things. The majority of the members of Congress in both party’s are there for themselves and their friends that support them and be damned with the country. They become more arrogant and blatant about it with each passing year.

[jazusamo]

Thanks for your post, Smooth.

A very appropriate post for this thread, Murtha along with a few others are the very worst of the abusers of pay to play.

[river rat]

I’m a dreamer.....

I dream of the day when scores of Congress Critters in irons are dragged down the steps of the Capital Building onto the Mall - where huge crowds of armed Americans are congregated around the several guillotines put in place.

The corrupt Congress Critters will be crying out and begging forgiveness and mercy..
All calls will fall on deaf ears, as heads roll and true reform is implemented.

As I admitted - I’m a dreamer.

[smoothsailing]

"These are crummy little firms. Many of them are located in Murtha's district.

I thought you'd like it! :)

[jazusamo]

If Congress Critters don’t come to realize just how far they’ve departed from what’s expected of them and change their ways your dream may one day become a reality.

[jazusamo]

Ken Boehm couldn’t have stated it any clearer, he’s absolutely correct and it’s what many of us have said for several years.

[river rat]

At 70, I'm too old, too damaged, been rode too hard and put away wet too frequently to possibly survive that long..

Based on what I see in society, the results of elections, the caliber of assholes in “public service” and “public leadership” positions, the focus of the media and the state of public education — there is no way the “correction” will occurred in my lifetime.

That being said - I will admit that I would certainly enjoy the opportunity of wasting a few dozen of this Republic's most dangerous enemies — those within.
Here in Kalifornicate, I live in a target rich Area of Operation.