Bring Back Pork Barrel Spending
You know — it may not be good for vegetarians, but Pork Barrel spending is good for the country. We desperately need it back.
What’s more officially known as the Earmark —a practice where you attach some spending project to a bill it has nothing to do with in order to bring back the pork to your district, is not only the American way — but also the lubricant we desperately need in order to get our government working again.
Without having the option to pay off of a legislator with a windmill project for their district or state, all we are left with is ideology. In fact, a ‘windmill’ for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell in ended the government shutdown in 2013. It could work to peel off some Republicans here too.
Many derided the ‘cornhusker kickback’ during the Affordable Care Act — but it made it possible to get Senator Nelson’s vote and the rest of us to get health insurance with no pre-existing conditions.
The idea here is, in places where they may not agree that funding a wall is stupid — you could build a new federal penitentiary that could create jobs that can be used to offset any of the loses you might have when running for re-election.
I would also like to argue that Earmarks are not always wasteful. In most districts, there are certain projects that are simply too expensive for a community to take on themselves — that may seem vanity but have a lasting effect that often goes beyond what’s measurable in dollars.
Consider the Glass City Skyway Bridge in Toledo, Ohio. The project was the biggest single project in the Ohio Department of Transportation’s history, coming in roughly at $237M. It replaced the Craig Bridge, which at the time was one of the last drawbridges in the interstate highway system — it would often get stuck in the upward position crippling the transportation network from Cleveland to Detroit — as well as adding another joke to the punchline that was Toledo, Ohio.
At the time, Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur, the longest serving female in the House of Representatives, was derided for bringing this pork home to Toledo. Our state, nor our community could never have afforded this bridge on our own. Sure, we could have continued to have this broken bridge on our interstate highway system, but it also has the lasting effect of empowering Marcy Kaptur, to vote for some pro choice provisions in the affordable care act despite her sizeable pro-life catholic base without really worrying about losing her seat.
The Earmark went away during the Obama years after immense pressure from both sides to cut back something called “Waste, Fraud & Abuse.” My question is — are you all happier now or then?
