| Unleash Prosperity Hotline Issue #223 2/16/2021 |
| 1) Congressional Democrats To Bring Back Earmarks One of the Republicans’ great achievements, when they took control of Congress in 2010, was to abolish the corrupt earmarking process, which gave us such porkers as the infamous Alaska Bridge to Nowhere. Democrats (and some Republicans) now want to bring back the pork projects, so members can bring home the bacon and buy votes. Punchbowl News reports that Senate Appropriations Chair Patrick Leahy of Vermont and House Appropriations Chair Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut will soon announce the return of earmarks into the appropriations process.  The late Senator Tom Coburn said earmarks serve as “a gateway drug on the road to spending addiction” and noted how many members feel compelled to vote for bloated spending bills out of fear their states or districts will be shortchanged. In vetoing a 1987 bill stuffed with earmarks, Ronald Reagan quoted Thomas Jefferson who warned that allowing Congress to spend federal money for local projects would set off “a scene of scramble among the members (for) who can get the most money wasted in their State, and they will always get most who are meanest.” We’re about to see Washington get even meaner, if that’s possible. |
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