Business as usual in Congress
posted by The Iconoclast @ 12:51 PM
2 Comments
Slaying Wikiality
Outlet for the rants of a small group of misguided individuals.
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
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2 Comments:
Unfortunately, 96%+ of these clowns are protected through gerrymandering and there is little or nothing that can be done. Jeff ‘Don Quixote’ Flake’s stand, while principled, is ineffectual. We need more radical reform that will make the districts more competitive, coupled with McCain’s earmark database, so that at least the activists in the electorate (who ultimately are the only ones electing the clowns) will know who they’re voting for.
I am even at a loss in trying to understand how most of these earmarks actually buy them votes in any numbers that matter. As the average number of Americans per Representative climbs towards the 700k mark, the impact of most of these boondoggles is less and less….. I think an organized campaign to expose sponsors, cost and impact of each of these would go a long way towards getting them voted out.
Clearly our congressmen can't help themselves when left alone with the nation's purse.
The thing I can never get my mind around with these stories of pork flowing to someone else's district is the fact that MY district never seems to get ANY pork! I constantly read outlandish tales of "bridges to nowhere" and special interest centers and museums in some congressman's district while the traffic in my region grows steadily worse, the services decline and the general standard of living languishes as taxes increase and the deficit balloons. I might muster a shred of complicit sympathy with all the pork slingers if I could see a visible slice of bacon anywhre in my district just once, but it always disappears into the deep pockets of those that lobbied for the pork in the first place. The average voter has no say whatsoever when the pork gets budgeted, and sees little if any benefit when it gets spent. And as long as the special interests' exclusive financial access to Congress gives them a disproportionate control over the legislative process the results will always be exactly the same.
Its a positive feedback loop with no end in sight.
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