What’s a paltry one million dollars to a member of Congress?
Republican Rep. Jeff Flake of Arizona, the fiscal crusader who’s never met an earmark he likes, questioned Democratic Rep. Peter J. Visclosky of Indiana on the House floor Tuesday about whether the Center for Instrumented Critical Infrastructure actually exists – since, hey, it’s getting like a million bucks or something.
Visclosky, who chairs the spending subcommittee responsible for the project, had to admit that, well, he didn’t have a clue.
After a lengthy back-and-forth, Flake, complaining that his staff couldn’t find a website for the center, asked Visclosky, “Does the center currently exist?”
“At this time, I do not know,” the Indiana Democrat replied. “But if it does not exist, the monies could not go to it.”
And who could possibly be the sponsor of such an earmark? Yes, you guessed it, the man Republicans love to hate, Pennsylvania Democrat John P. Murtha.
Despite the money’s uncertain destination, the House rejected Flake’s measure to strike the funds, 326-98. And the Visclosky bill also sailed through, 312-112.
NewsBusters had this link today:
WashingtonWatch.com is a Web site “maintained by Jim Harper, Director of Information Policy Studies at the Cato Institute, in his spare time, as a public service.” Harper puts a dollar figure on the bright (or frankly mostly not-so-bright) ideas that Congress toys with day in and day out.
July 18, 2007 - 05:59 AM on July 18th, 2007
If this money goes anywhere near Murtha, not only Murtha should be indicted and expelled, but any Congresscritter that defended this appropriation.
July 18, 2007 - 10:37 AM on July 18th, 2007
[...] Your tax dollars at work… but for whom? Bookmark to: 07.18.07 at 11:37 am | More like this
id He Just Say [...]
July 21, 2007 - 12:06 PM on July 21st, 2007
I heard it on the radio and I still can’t believe it. Executives all over the place have to practically sign their lives away if the books aren’t reported accuately because of Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX), but they can wink-wink at this stuff all day long.