Saturday, October 04, 2008

McPork


"Well, the first thing we have to do is get spending under control in Washington. It's completely out of control. It's gone -- we have now presided over the largest increase in the size of government since the Great Society.

We Republicans came to power to change government, and government changed us. And the -- the worst symptom on this disease is what my friend, Tom Coburn, calls earmarking as a gateway drug, because it's a gateway. It's a gateway to out-of-control spending and corruption.

And we have former members of Congress now residing in federal prison because of the evils of this earmarking and pork-barrel spending. " -- John McCain during the 9/26/08 Presidential Debate

McCain used the word "pork" no less than five times during debate, saying that as president, he's going to eliminate upwards of $18 billion of it! Can anyone tell me what he did to try to eliminate the $150 billion in pork on the behemoth bailout?

3 comments:

Zen Wizard said...

What p!sses me off about the bailout bill is that it was "emergency" legislation that we "reluctantly" approved to avoid a disaster.

Stuff like "safe wooden arrows for kids" and "money for auto racing track development" make a joke of the bill, which was otherwise an example of how the system "worked"--i.e., on usual days off, both sides of the aisle got together because of the exigency of the situation.

Also, earmarks reward the RECALCITRANT, NON-TEAM players.

You are rewarded for being a stubborn jackass with pork for your district. (We all know that the holdouts get the pork...it is a "dangling carrot.")

It's like giving a little kid $5 for flipping off his mom.

Even more disgusting I feel was the pork in the "Resolution against the War in Iraq" a couple years ago: Flood prevention in Sacramento, peanut research in Georgia, etc.

C'mon!

I'm all for flood prevention in Sacramento, but it should be a "stand-alone" bill on its own merits or lack thereof.

Erin O'Brien said...

To be honest, I don't get all that upset over the particular projects. But the way McCain trumpeted and railed on about pork, then tags along on this mother of a bill without making any noise about the "sweeteners" just made me sick.

And of course you're right, Zen, that a dozen stubborn congressmen cost us $150 billion is simply insane--not that the $700 billion to start with wasn't.

Hal said...

McCain's campaign announced it's going to start going very negative against Obama (as if it hasn't already). It's one of the ways he's going to run away from this thing as fast as he can.

*Wink*