NY Times: "House Democratic leaders on Wednesday banned budget earmarks to private
industry, ending a practice that has steered billions of dollars in
no-bid contracts to companies and set off corruption scandals." The charge was lead by House Appropriations Committee Chair David Obey (D-WI).
Earmarks are financing awards for pet projects to various groups and businesses that lawmakers often embed within Congressional finance bills. They are typically seen as kick backs in return for campaign contributions. Last year's Defense Appropriations bill contained 1,720 earmarks at a cost of $4.2 billion.
In what has become an extremely rare battle for the moral high ground, Republicans today unanimously voted not just to ban corporate earmarks but to ban all earmarks across the board, which would include funding for state, local, and nonprofit organizations. According to the AP, these earmarks are typically "grants to police departments, improvements to military bases, renovations to historic buildings, research grants for home-district colleges" but also include projects like the infamous Alaskan "bridge to nowhere."
Democrats are claiming that corporate earmarks are really the main issue, as companies and lobbying firms have invested billions of dollars in campaign contributions in order to get Congress to see things in their favor.
This debate comes in the face of a recent Ethics Committee investigation that found "simply because a member sponsors an earmark for an entity that also happens to be a campaign contributor does not, on these two facts alone, support a claim that a member's actions are being influenced by campaign contributions."
Democrats, who have been marred by a number of recent ethics scandals, are taking a big risk by refusing to ban earmarks across the board, as the public is nearly universally opposed to the practice altogether. Of course, there very well could be unrealized costs to eliminating not-for-profit earmarks. One such cost could be that House members are expected to vote on the Senate Health Reform bill, which has a number of earmarks in it. It's uncertain Democrats are expecting to deal with the impasse between the House and the Senate.
Senate members on both sides of the isle showed no interest in following suit with the earmark ban.
Sen. Thad Cochran (R- MS) said "Congress cannot ignore its constitutional responsibilities to approve the allocation of federal funds." Senate Appropriations panel chair Dan Inouye (D-HI) also criticized the House resolutions.
At the very least, this seems to me like a step in the right direction. It could boil down to political grandstanding, but if the end result is a universal ban on earmarks in the House, the Senate may have no choice but to follow suit. Whether Republicans or Democrats lead the charge to curb spending, this is one bit of political theater I can applaud.
As news reports of resilient Iraqi voters began to come in over the airwaves yesterday, I found myself for the first time in seven years thinking of Iraq as a country other then "U.S.- occupied" Iraq.
According to Al Jazeera, the voter turnout for this weekend's parliamentary elections was about 62.5%, despite the constant threat of bombing campaigns that left 38 people dead and 89 wounded. Now I should point out that this is down from the +70% turnout in the 2005 elections, however this election saw significantly larger participation among the minority Sunni population who had largely felt left out of the political process in earlier elections.The results may still be weeks if not months away as 86 political groups vie for majority rule of the 325 parliamentary seats, but the elections were by and large a success.
(In contrast, the United States hasn't had a voter turnout this high since Kennedy's election in 1960- we just scrapped past with 63.1%.)
Of course, this celebration of voter turnout does not makeup for the roughly 100,000 Iraqi civilians that have been killed since the U.S. invasion, or the 4700 soldiers that have lost their lives, or the $700 Billion dollars- yes, that's $700 billion dollars- that has been spent on the occupation of Iraq. The reasonably successful elections in Iraq also do not make up for the sacrifice of America's reputation in the eyes of the world, and especially the escalation of tensions in the middle east. And worst of all, Iraq's elections do not satisfy my frustration over having been lead into a war on the false pretense of Weapons of Mass Destruction, or that Iraq was somehow a threat to the United States and was working with Al Qaeada.
But the joke is on us.
What we have now is a philosophical conundrum. Iraqis are no longer bombing U.S. encampments- they're bombing themselves. Shi'ites are intent to keep the former Sunni Bathist party from coming anywhere near their new parliamentary government (they barred over 500 Sunni candidates from the elections), and thus a cultural partisan divide has now become politically entrenched. 86 parties will vie for political power, 86 different interests, all with friends and enemies alike, only unlike in the United State, violence is a very real political persuader.
Yet, despite it all, I can't help but feel that Iraq is better off fighting amongst themselves and free then to have been dictated over under the guise of a peaceful existence. As Iraq spars for political legitimacy, I've been asking myself if I had a magic wand and could take away this democracy (dysfunctional as all democracies are) and return them to the rule of Saddam Hussein, would I? I would want to, but only because of the consequences suffered by the hands of an abusive administration have been great on the United States. I would undo the Iraq war for my own reasons- for the betterment of America- not for the betterment of Iraq.
I do not feel what we did was right. I can not justify it. But I do feel Iraq is better off. Perhaps this is equivalent to throwing a child through demoralizing foster care to protect them from violent alcoholic parents- maybe the child ends up dysfunctional in the end anyway. But somewhere, there is a moral stand being taken, isn't there? Perhaps it was not done for the reasons we romanticize, but it's up to everyone to give value and purpose to our mistakes. As I look at the failings of my own life, and the difficulties and consequences therein, I've had no choice but to give meaning to every misstep, no matter how painful they were to admit. You can't move forward without coming to terms with the wrongs you've committed. Perhaps the purpose of this War has yet to be realized, but I, for one, am willing to find the value in tragedy.
In this country, you have the right to bare arms. It is our constitutionally given right to purchase as many guns as you so desire, to shoot them as many times as you desire, and should you desire to arm a small militia, this is your right. You don't need a license, there are no reoccurring fees or stringent requirements and you can simply go down to your local Wal-Mart or a gun show and purchase one for a very reasonable price.
If someone comes onto your property, you have the right to shoot them.
If you shoot someone, you have the right to a lawyer. Lawyers can be extremely expensive, but since we have demanded that every citizen be granted to right to counsel (even though this one's not in the constitution) if you can't afford a lawyer, the state will pay for one to represent you.
All of these things we have demanded because in this country we believe in the land of the free- freedom from oppression, be it government oppression, legal oppression, or oppression from your fellow man. And in all these instances, we have put in place protections to assure that an American has the freedom to live his life as he sees fit.
Unless you get sick.
You have NO right to a doctor. Your right to state-appointed assistance ends at the courthouse steps.
You have the right to buy a gun, shoot someone who walks onto your property, and to have a lawyer paid for by the state to represent you but that person you shot (whether in cold blood or not) has no right to see a doctor. He'll be treated but he will spend the next twenty years of his life working to pay off the medical bills that were charged to him.
In this country, you have the right to destroy, but you do not have the right to pull yourself out of destruction.
Demand the right to carry a gun and deny others the right to afford a doctor. Because, in this country, health care is not a right, it is a privilege.
Owning a gun is not a privilege, it is a right.
Seeing a doctor is not a right, it is a privilege.
...what happened here?
