‘Reform’ To Nowhere

How the crusade against earmarks threatens constitutional democracy.

By David Sirota

I had never heard of an ice sled before. I had heard of ice, had always wanted to see the Iditarod race, and had been briefly obsessed with Olympic luge competitions. But seven years ago, if you had forced me to guess what an ice [RETURN TO ARTICLE]

  • Reader Comments

     Page 1 of 1 pages

    I’ve never heard anyone claim that all earmarks are wasteful. The problem is, it’s incredibly difficult to separate the wasteful earmarks from the useful ones. Rep. DeFazio’s concept of accountability is obviously self-serving—“I spend federal money on local projects, and I keep getting re-elected”—well, imagine that! But what about the rest of us who are paying for DeFazio’s projects? Is it unreasonable for us to ask for some oversight in the process?

    A huge assumption runs through David Sirota’s article—that useful projects can only be funded through earmarks. There is no alternative. This is the way we’ve always done it; therefore this is the only way it can be done.

    Well, baloney. Get rid of the earmarks first. Then, if you have a worthy project that you want the federal government to finance, make a case for it and you just might get your money. If we’d had oversight early in the process, and not after-the-fact, there never would have been a controversy about ice sleds to begin with.

    United States Posted by marcello09 on Apr 27, 2009 at 6:22 AM
     Page 1 of 1 pages

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