Omnibusting: Omnibus Spending Bill, Earmarks, Pork and Budget Gimmicks

9 responses so far ↓

• Conservatives Wants Bush to Take Stand Against Pork « Omnibusting // December 18, 2007 at 7:18 am

  [...] far, however, 9,170 earmarks have been discovered in the 2008 omnibus spending bill. This amount, in addition to the 2,161 earmarks in the 2008 [...]

• Over the River and Through the Woods . . . « Omnibusting // December 18, 2007 at 2:00 pm

  [...] included in the approximately 2100 earmarks found in the 586 page Joint Explanatory Statement for Transportation are two roadside [...]

• DouglasWard.net » Blog Archive » Another Omnibus Budget // December 18, 2007 at 4:30 pm

  [...] (according to a Senate staffer) and 11,402 earmarks (according to Heritage’s excellent Ominibuster blog). There are hundreds of new earmarks previously undisclosed–115 worth $117 million in the [...]

• Bluey Blog | RobertBluey.com » All I Want for Christmas Is a Continuing Resolution // December 18, 2007 at 4:50 pm

  [...] For as frustrating as it is to watch McConnell roll over, what’s even more disappointing is that President Bush is willing to sign a bill (assuming troop funding for Iraq is added) that violates so many of the principles he’s been fighting for all year. The bill is nearly $20 billion more than Bush’s top-line number when “emergencies” are factored in and comes nowhere close to slashing pork projects in half. [...]

• The Baltimore Reporter // December 18, 2007 at 10:18 pm

  [...] (and rightly) that the bill is something of a “Christmas Tree,” containing more than 9,000 earmarked pork projects and $11 billion in so-called “emergency funding” (actually a widely used [...]

• EckerNet.Com » Blog Archive » History Repeats Itself // December 19, 2007 at 12:25 am

  [...] Immigration Reform, is the latest actions of Congress. Buried in a 3500 page omnibus, filled with over 11,000 earmarks, is language that basically guts the entire Secure Fence [...]

• You've Been Had! Government Waste - Political Forum - US & World Political Discussion Forums // December 20, 2007 at 11:10 am

  [...] tally of pork projects is calculated and then taken out of legislative salaries and pensions? MM 11,402 Earmarks and Counting Omnibusting: Omnibus Spending Bill, Earmarks, Pork and Budget Gimmicks 11,402 Earmarks and Counting December 17, 2007 A source on the Hill has conducted a rough count [...]

• Want to Solve Government Corruption? Earmarks are Small Potatoes : The Sundries Shack // February 14, 2008 at 1:17 pm

  [...] selfish greed that typifies Congress and no one, not even Ron Paul, is immune. That there are over 11,000 of them in the latest Omnibus bill is a travesty. But they’re only the first step in dealing [...]

• 

  outragedtaxpayer // June 7, 2008 at 7:12 am

  Some months ago I was treated to the spectacle of a K Street
  lobbyist explaining how one goes about legally bribing Congressmen and
  Senators to get them to deliver a million dollar earmark. The lobbyist
  was too well trained to use words like “bribe” or “graft,” but the
  message was clear. I’d like to share it because I’ve been told that
  sunlight is the best disinfectant.

  I pride myself on my cynicism. I haven’t voted in years, have
  never voted for a Republican, and the last Democrat I voted for was
  Jimmy Carter (the first time). Yet despite my resignation to the
  institutionalized corruption in Washington, the matter-of-fact nature
  of this sales pitch offended me so deeply I feel compelled to speak
  out.

  I was introduced to this lobbyist by a prospective angel
  investor in a privately-held company on whose board I sit. This
  investor, who I admire, is a wealthy self-made man, the kind of smart,
  hard-working immigrant this country could use more of. Although he is
  still learning the ways of his adopted land, he appears to be a quick
  study. His advice to our fledgling startup: Congress is giving away
  buckets of money and we would be foolish not to get some.

  The lobbyist, employed by a prestigious law firm, hails from a
  tradition of service. His resume shouts duty-honor-country. You would
  never expect to see him pop up in a Boss Tweed cartoon.

  I signed no non-disclosure agreements prior to our call, nor
  was I sworn to secrecy, nor did anyone reveal the secret handshake.
  The lobbyist didn’t know me from Adam. I could have been a front for
  Woodward and Bernstein. I can only assume I’m not the only one who
  heard his pitch that week.

  So, how does one buy a million dollar earmark? The lobbyist
  costs $6,500 per month plus a 7.5% kick-back, more genteelly called a
  “commission.” The lobbyist makes sure that your application is
  properly constructed and gets into the overflowing earmark inbox of
  your particular Congressman by the specified date. More importantly,
  he makes sure that your Congressman, the two members of your Senate
  delegation, and the chairman of the targeted appropriations
  subcommittee (an apparently central player in this process named Peter
  Visclosky) all understand the importance of your request. Failure to
  line up all four of these supporters results in proportional
  discounting of your earmark.

  I inquired how we go about convincing these keepers of the
  public trust of the merits of our project. “By holding fund raisers,”
  explained the lobbyist.

  “Is there a price list?” Nothing is written down but the
  lobbyist assured me that the going rate is $10,000 per Congressman and
  $20,000 per Senator. Wow, these guys work cheap, I thought. We can’t
  even get simple audits done for that price, much less buy a million
  dollar earmark. This must be some volume operation.

  “Can our company write $60,000 worth of checks and be done with
  it?” I asked. Oh no, I was told. That would be illegal. “Donations”
  must come from employees, directors, and their families in individual
  checks that do not exceed hard-money limits. I noted that our company
  is still quite small, which means that to collect $60,000 everyone
  connected with the company would have to write checks, not all of whom
  could afford that level of “generosity.” Never mind whether they even
  support the political positions of the target legislators. (What are their
  names, again?) The lobbyist patiently explained that it was perfectly legal
  for a company to give bonuses to employees provided these are not
  directly tied in timing and amounts to political donations in such an
  obvious way that they could be construed as illegal reimbursements.

  Not being accustomed to this way of doing business, I asked how
  we could be sure that “donations” made before the earmark was
  delivered would be honored. “Let me put it this way,” assured the
  lobbyist, “they’ve never let us down.”

  There was a little more to it than that, but not much. The
  lobbyist explained that the money, or “plus-up” as they call it, had
  to be routed through a funding agency, and not every federal agency is
  willing to be a party to this process. “But,” he advised, “agencies
  under budget stress are usually willing to cooperate.” In return for
  passing along the money, the conduit agency keeps a handling fee of
  anywhere from 5% to 15%. I didn’t ask what that negotiation involved.

  So here’s the math. A year’s worth of lobbyist fees comes to
  $78,000. The company’s compensation committee doles out $60,000 worth
  of bonuses on the understanding that directors and executives must be
  comfortable swearing under oath that these bonuses are not intended to
  reimburse political donations, even though they are. Figure a 7.5%
  commission for the lobbying firm and a 10% commission for the funding
  agency adds another $175,000 to the bill. For a total investment of
  $313,000, then, the company gets $1,000,000 in taxpayer money with no
  strings attached. This is better than a threefold return in less than
  a year. I wish all my investments did that well.

  The phone call ended cordially and I had a sleepless night.
  Everyone else is doing it. No one could ever prove that we’d broken
  the law. Our competitors are getting earmarks, which they proudly
  announce in press releases. Our promising young company is just as
  deserving of support, and certainly more so than a lot of earmark
  recipients we’ve all read about in the papers. And as one of the 1% of
  the taxpayers who carry nearly 40% of our country’s income tax burden,
  it’s my own money they’re giving away, damn it. Would it be so wrong
  to try to see some of it put to good use?

  Perhaps out of romantic nostalgia, I keep a pocket copy of the
  U.S. Constitution on my desk. When I woke up the next morning one look
  at the cover answered my question. Instead of holding a “fund raiser”
  I offer you this testimony. I wish I had the courage to put my name on
  it but I fear exposing our portfolio companies to retribution by our
  esteemed elected officials, whose unbounded power over our economic
  affairs is only enabled by our willingness to keep paying for it.

  # # #

  Outraged Taxpayer

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