Bailout Binge: Senate Porkers Know No Shame
So the Senate labored well into the evening to pass the bailout bill. Well, they were certainly hard at work all right… working to tack on layers of pork to the bill. There were tax cuts, of course, spread scatter-shot across the spectrum. Tax cuts for individuals, for businesses… I believe there was even a tax cut for poodles who earn money in dog shows. Money for rural schools was included. (That was a GOP initiative.) Some of these may sound like important proposals, depending upon your preferences. How about some pork for Puerto Rican manufacturers of Rum? Not to worry… it’s in there. Some slabs of cash for the makers of wooden arrows for children? You bet! Wool research? 128 million for auto racing tracks??? It’s all in there, baby.
Is there anyone who can take a page from John McCain’s play book and make these people famous? Who put these riders in there? Pardon my bringing up an unpleasant subject, but wasn’t this supposed to be the must-have crap sandwich that we absolutely had to have in order to save us from an economic Pearl Harbor? The most critical action of the last 100 years, wasn’t it? And yet, some of our Senators managed to take time out of their busy day to once again festoon such a critical bill with this sort of thing. An already-expensive bill had an additional $3.8 billion entitlement program for mandatory mental health care coverage by insurance companies.
To borrow a quote from Joe Scarborough this morning, these people simply have no shame. They can’t help themselves. In what they are all billing as the defining moment of their congressional lives, they somehow can not stop themselves from strapping on the old Federal Feed Bag and loading on the pork. Wasn’t the word “clean” being bandied about earlier, in terms of how the bill must be passed? The concept is foreign to this crowd, and they don’t even deserve the 14% approval rating they somehow cling to in the polls. If the crap sandwich in question is really that critical to our survival, then pass the damned thing and live with the consequences. By treating it as yet another vehicle for their insatiable hunger for handouts, they prove they shouldn’t be drawing a paycheck on our dime.
30 Responses to “Bailout Binge: Senate Porkers Know No Shame”
I told people earlier about this bill and that it's laden with all kinds of goodies.
It's another bad bill.
The House should reject this bad bill just as it rejected the earlier bad bill.
The House has been the best thing in Washington currently. Heroes!
http://cbs2chicago.com/topstories/rescue.plan.c…
http://cbs2chicago.com/topstories/rescue.plan.c…
As I said yesterday… we're ungoverned.
Is there a breakdown anywhere online that links the various cutlets of pork to their sponsors?
John McCain voted for this bill did he not? Will he proceed to publicly flog himself for voting for pork?
I could be that the pork was included to turn away vegan Congresspeople.
Isn't the solution to this to simply have pork-only legislation? If pork projects are necessary, fine, pass a pork bill that has five, ten, a hundred pork projects listed and nothing else. Why, oh why is this stuff allowed to be tacked on to other bills? The only reason I can see is to either sneak stuff through without scrutiny or to get it passed because the main bill is too important to fail.
Didn't McCain say he would veto any spending bill that had pork in it? I agree Chris. Granted he isn't the President but why try to be a champion of the anti-pork wagon if he is just going along for the ride?
Yes, Chris, John McCain voted for this bill.
In all fairness, not to McCain (and Obama) but to those who actually want a bailout (let's assume a truly clean bailout), it's probably the following on Bernanke's mind that moved them to support a bailout, at least in theory. (I do _not_ support a bailout; the borrowers and the lenders should be left alone, and those destined to fail should of course fail.)
Bernanke bailout testimony
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2008/09/23/berna…
Speech on deflation
http://www.federalreserve.gov/BOARDDOCS/SPEECHE…
Because, if you don't attach it to a politically important bill, it's too easy to defeat.
Ah, J. Chem, but McCain's not in office yet. “So, my friends, this is why you should elect me as your next president — so I can veto, with this pen [pulling pen from pocket], future bills like this.”
Hello… The pork was added FOR the House Republicans to get them on-board!
and both McCain and Obama voted yea. It's the clear-coat and floor mats philosophy.
Senators can't defeat bills (or speak out against them) in the Senate these days?
Hmm. Congressman (or Congresswomen) = crack addict? Nah, they are den of thieves and whores, put in place by the American public.
And Chris, love your pointing out that McCain voted for it, without one word that Obama and Biden did as well.
[sigh] Don't leap to illogical inferences or conclusions from what I post.
My (obvious) point was that McCain is a hypocrite. He voted _FOR_ the bill.
AR,
Obama and Biden aren't anti-pork crusaders. During last Friday's debate, when the subject was the economic crisis, all McCain could bring himself to talk about was earmarks and wasteful spending.
Chris -
Thanks. That explains it. Obama/Biden are pro-pork; only McCain is against it.
AR,
Even with absurdly simplified characterization of Obama's position, I doubt you'll get anyone to actually care.
Chris – I wasn't making any comment on Obama's position, and it isn't my statement that was absurd. It was yours, that that they are not anti-pork crusaders, so by inference it was OK for them to vote for the bill, but not McCain. That was the whole point.
AR,
Here's an analogy… say you think any abortion is murder, then how can you justify letting state's decide the legality of abortion? Should the definition of murder change from state to state?
When you take a hardline approach, like McCain, you have the obligation to live up to it, or at the very least, explain why you didn't. McCain has done neither in this case of pork.
False analogy, Chris. To answer your question, incidentally, you let states decide the legality of abortion because it's not your place (i.e., that of the person we're considering) to decide in place of states, given that in our constitutional federal system the legislation of abortion is correctly and properly left to state and local governments as they see fit.
You were closer to the point later in your posting, which incidentally applies to _any_ approach or position on an issue. McCain is against pork, so he shouldn't have voted for this second bad bill that's full of it. He could at least have insisted that the pork be left out and only the actual bailout be in the bill. (It's stupid as well as insulting for the Senate to try to bribe the House by loading the bill with pork, that constitutes an additional $100+ B in pork!)
DLS – actually, you changed his premise to fit your answer. If an individual truly believes that ALL abortion is murder, then I would expect that person to support a national ban on abortion, not leave it up to the states.
Your answer is the position of those such as myself that believe that Roe v Wade was a violation of the 10th Amendment.
Obama is the anti tax breaks for the rich at the expense of the middle class candidate; McCain is the “anti pork” candidate. But when it comes to greatest good for the greatest number — (i.e. the basic principle on which a Democratic government is founded) they BOTH had to compromise their political values to compel the so called “conservative” Republicans who threw a hissy fit at being served a chicken bill, instead of a leg of pork on Monday + to keep the Dems and Reps who did like the original House version from crying out “NAY” the next time around. That's being “bullish” on the economy!
But then again, this was to be expected! After all, we're all trying to clean up the sty left behind by precisely these so called “conservatives” who were running the Congress and the Presidency since 2000.
Um, that is news to me. I thought Congress (both houses,in fact) was currently under Democratic control. When did the Republicans win it back?
“If an individual truly believes that ALL abortion is murder, then I would expect that person to support a national ban on abortion, not leave it up to the states.”
More than one issue is at stake here. Constitutional federalism becomes an additional issue whenever a national (federal) law of any kind is considered.
A federal law (written and passed by Congress) on abortion would violate the Tenth Amendment. A judicial decision such as Roe v. Wade also violates other parts of the constitution because judicial power is vested in the courts while legislative power is vested in Congress, and Roe v. Wade was an instance of the judiciary arrogating the power of Congress (legislative power). It's one branch usurping the power and role of another.
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Get ready for another bailout, this time of a state long controlled by Democrats.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/politics/cal/…
[...] believe there was even a tax cut for poodles who earn money in dog shows,” wrote Jazz Shaw at The Moderate Voice. (That was a [...]