Congress puts its marker on Iraq war, but how big?
The Senate, following the House's vote Friday, is to weigh a war-funding bill – with exit dates.
from the March 26, 2007 edition
Page 3 of 3
'Goodies' for votes: a list of add-ons to the House war-funding bill
A subplot in Congress's debate over war funding is how lawmakers deal with nondefense add-ons for pet projects.
In its first test of new rules requiring disclosure of names of members sponsoring "earmarks," the House saw a spat over whether the spirit and letter of the anti-"pork" rules were met.
House leaders said last week that, in keeping with rules passed at the start of the new Congress, no member projects were included in the US Troop Readiness, Veterans' Health and Iraq Accountability Act.
Challenged as to why a $35 million add-on for NASA's Stennis Space Center in Mississippi was not listed as an earmark, Rep. David Obey (D) of Michigan said, "An earmark is something that is requested by an individual member. This item was not requested by any individual member. It was put in the bill by me." (Rep. Gene Taylor (D) of Mississippi, in whose district the funds would be spent, did not support the bill.)
The move violates the spirit, if not the letter, of new House rules, say budget watchdog groups.
"It seems the commitment to reform was short-lived, as Congress fattens up the emergency-spending bill with special-interest goodies," says Tom Schatz, president of Citizens Against Government Waste, a public-interest group in Washington.
Another public-interest group, Taxpayers for Common Sense, objected that Senate appropriators did not allow TV cameras or the public into their markup last week and that a transcript is not yet available to the public.
Below is a partial list of nonwar-related provisions added to the House emergency- spending bill.
MILLIONS ($) PURPOSE
$500 Emergency wildfire suppression
400 Rural schools
283 Milk subsidies
140 Shrimp and fishing industries that suffered losses after hurricane Katrina
100 Citrus growers for losses from hurricanes Katrina or Rita
74 Peanut storage
60 Salmon fisheries in the Klamath River region in California and Oregon
50 Asbestos removal from the US Capitol power plant
48 Salaries and expenses for the Farm Service Agency
35 Risk mitigation at NASA's Stennis Space Center on the Gulf Coast
25 Spinach growers
25 Hurricane compensation for livestock producers
16 Security upgrades to House of Representative office buildings
10 Flood control along the Rio Grande River
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