When it comes to today's topic du jour -- legislative earmarks -- it's fascinating how the political world turned President Obama into John McCain.
That's right, for those of us who followed the two-year-long presidential campaign, it was McCain who crusaded against earmarks, not Obama (who instead said he would work to reform the process and make it more transparent). In fact, had earmarks been the public's top concern in November, the Arizona senator probably would have won the election. But, as we all know, it wasn't. "As president of the United States, I want to assure you, I've got a pen . and I'm going to veto every single spending bill that comes across my desk. I will make them famous. You will know their names," McCain said at the first debate. Obama countered, "[L]et's be clear: Earmarks account for $18 billion in last year's budget. Senator McCain is proposing . $300 billion in tax cuts to some of the wealthiest corporations and individuals in the country, $300 billion."
Obama's Reform: Yet at 11:20 am ET today, President Obama will make an announcement on earmark reform, which comes after the Senate last night passed its $410 billion omnibus spending bill that contains $7.7 billion (or less than 2%) in earmarks.
Of course, Obama deserves some of the blame (or credit) for all the focus on earmarks. He celebrated the fact that his stimulus didn't contain earmarks. Also, given the humongous price tag of the stimulus, the bailouts, and the home-foreclosure plan, it was inevitable that every bit in extra spending -- i.e., $7.7 billion in earmarks -- would receive extra scrutiny. And during the campaign, in response to McCain's rhetoric, Obama promised to reform the earmark process. "When I'm president," he said, "I will go line by line to make sure that we are not spending money unwisely." What has gone largely ignored, however, is the philosophical debate over earmarks. Indeed, one person's wasteful spending and pork is another person's important project and constituent service. After all, unless your name is John McCain, chances are that your constituents back home expect you to bring home the bacon. As the Washington Post points out, only five senators didn't add pet projects to the omnibus: McCain, DeMint (R), Coburn (R), Feingold (D), and McCaskill (D).
But let's also make no mistake: Today's announcement on earmark reform is intended to give Obama cover for signing the omnibus legislation, which he's expected to do today.
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said yesterday, per the Washington Times: "Although it's not perfect, the president will sign the legislation, but demonstrate for all involved rules moving forward that he thinks can make this process work a little bit better." But does Obama sign the bill publicly? It is important to note that the president set himself up a bit for today's criticism, since he decided to jump on the anti-earmark bandwagon and his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, was one of the more aggressive anti-earmark members when he was in Congress. Emanuel, in fact, was among the first to go public with his requests and push the disclosure angle. In many ways, Obama wants to take a victory lap today, noting that his push for disclosure is among the reasons we know who ordered up what earmark. Still, congressional Dems did him no favors with allowing this leftover bill to be on THIS president's desk rather than Bush. The Dems got a bit greedy.
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