The logic that says the increase in earmarks is due to the increased power and influence of lobbyists is spurious. In this sense, the Republican spin on Abramoff is, and this is only by accident, true. Abramoff’s ability to pile up large sums of money, thanks to his direct and unfettered access to former Majority Leader Tom Delay and his staff, was an aberration. For the most part, lobbyists are lucky if they can get their clients in to see the Chairman and Ranking Member of the committees which control their desired pot of gold. Further, even when they do get in to see these powerful members, normally meaning those on the bodies Appropriations committee, that does not guarantee support of their project or cause.
How though, you might ask, could a member of congress afford to ignore the influence and desires of a powerful lobbyist, what with the lunches they offer, and the box seats to the Nationals, Wizards, and Redskins game. It’s pretty easy and simple actually. The federal budget is the scarcest of scarce resources. 99.9% of members would never waste their precious few earmarks (members of the house, especially more freshman members who sit on relatively unimportant committees especially get few, if any, earmarks) on “pork.” Now, that leads to a legitimate debate over what precisely pork is. Looking at a list of earmarked projects, I could quite easily assume a project in South Dakota is pork, but I don’t know that, and neither does the federal bureaucracy. Deference, with regards to the interests and needs of a local district, is paid to that districts representative, as it should be.
Which leads to the most intriguing part of the earmark debate. Those who crusade against earmarks are reliably conservative lawmakers, who are looking for some piece of the reform mantle to call their own. Some, like Representative Flake and Senator McCain have been calling for the removal of earmarks for some time now and their desire for change is not being questioned. However, I do question what their final goal is. If the power to direct spending, to earmark, is taken from Congress, those earmarked funds would not go to offset the deficit, rather, they would go directly to the federal agency charged with overseeing the program out of which the earmarks have been removed. In other words, lets take the decision-making process out of the hands of elected officials and give it to bureaucrats. Personally, I don’t have a big problem with it, but it seems to go directly against the conservative dogma of less control to Washington.
As bogus as some of them are, earmarks are here to stay. Yes, the presence of earmarks will continue, as will, to some degree, the role of lobbyists in government. But here’s another secret of the earmark trade that lobbyists probably don’t want you to here … lobbyists, for the most part, don’t matter. Sure, they might get you in the door and they might rack of a big bill, but in the end, if the project doesn’t serve a compelling local interest, its not going to cut muster. Just remember what Tip said, “all politics is local” … whether it takes place in Washington, on K Street, or in your congressional district.
UPDATE: After I wrote this, I got to thinking about ways that Democrats could use the debate over earmarks in the 2006 campaign. Thankfully, before I got too frustrated, something came ot me. Democrats should call for the removal of all earmakrs from the Department of Defense, Department of State, and any other national security related agency. Further, Democrats should insist that the Department of Homeland Security’s budget remain free of earmarks (under a gentleman’s agreement between the House and Senate, earmarking the DHS budget has been taboo thus far). There is no room for pork when it comes to national security … I’d like to see the Republicans run against that.
