Earmark ban costs Burnett County, Wisconsin

Federal earmarks represent less than half  of 1% of the federal budget.

Compared to  the trillion dollar (and counting) wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the $1.6 trillion Bush era high income tax cuts, the $500 billion prescription drug bill, and the recession, earmarks have played virtually no role in creating the deficit.

Yet Republicans have made earmarks a national issue. The House of Representatives has banned them as has President Obama.

Now local communities, like Burnett County, Wisconsin, that used these federal dollars to fund socially necessary local projects are having second thoughts. Local governmental leaders from both political parties have realized that the moratorium on earmarks will force them to eliminate valuable and necessary projects or raise property taxes to pay for them.

Just a few weeks ago, Republicans in the House of Representatives insisted that the Bush era tax cuts be extended for those making over $250,000 annually. This will cost $81.5 billion over two years and Burnett County the modern communications system that it sorely needs and cannot afford..

The New York Times article on how local officials are rethinking the ban on earmarks is linked here.

Senator McCain's obsession

Senator John McCain has been pounding tables and railing against earmarks as if they were responsible for the nation's economic malaise.

New York Times' columnist Bob Herbert writes:

Earmarks.

More than 4.4 million jobs have been lost since this monster recession officially got under way in December 2007, and we’ve got people wigging out over earmarks. Folks, get a grip. Some earmarks are good, some are not, but collectively they account for a tiny, tiny portion of the national budget — less than 1 percent.

Freaking out over earmarks is like watching a neighborhood that is being consumed by flames and complaining that there is crabgrass on some of the lawns.

His column is linked.

Palin hired lobbyist to pursue earmarks!

Alaskan Gov. Sarah Palin and her supporters continue to claim she opposed the Bridge to Nowhere when in fact she supported it until it was on its deathbed.

She and John McCain claim she opposed "earmarks" when the truth is as Mayor she hired lobbyists to pursue them even as Joe Klein reports Alaska's oil revenues and federal deficits were soaring.

Palin sought $197 million in so-called "earmarks" for 2009. In the previous budget year, she asked for earmarks worth $256 million.

She claims she sold a state plane on eBay, for a profit. Neither claim is true.

The McCain Palin campaign is the most dishonest in recent memory as the attached CNN report makes clear.