President Obama tells us this is the time for fiscal responsibility, yet the Congressional omnibus bill is loaded down with pork. Nearly $8 billion worth of special projects are found in the bill, and the Democrats say the Republicans are playing politics by pointing it out:
Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer, D-Md., distributed a handout Tuesday at his weekly news conference entitled, "You can’t spell ‘earmark’ without an ‘R,’" which stated that 40 percent of the earmark dollars included in the bill were sponsored by Republicans.
The appropriations omnibus (HR 1105) is scheduled for a House vote Wednesday.
"Republicans are continuing to try to sweep their history under the rug and convince the American people that they are committed to fiscal responsibility," stated the handout. "But their record on earmarks and the amount of earmarks contained in the omnibus appropriations bill make it clear that Republicans are just using this as another political ploy."
You know what would be cool? If Steny Hoyer weren’t right.
Republicans have a hard row to hoe here. They need to condemn the Democrats here for their outrageous spending, but in doing so, find themselves the target. They have this coming and frankly, I hope it hurts. They need to understand the damage they have done to the Republican brand by feeding into the same spending habits of the Democrats.
However, they can fight this by simply pointing out that the past actions of the Republicans don’t excuse the current actions of the Democrats. It’s a logical fallacy and can be cast aside. The main way to do this is to get rid of all those Republican earmarks, and then talk with the knuckleheads who put them in there in the first place.
This monster has almost 9,000 earmarks in it. And like Hoyer said, nearly 40% of those belong to Republicans. Clean up your own house before telling the neighbor to clean his.
