Pork-Barrel Projects Continue to Pick America's Pockets - Opinion

Pork-Barrel Projects Continue to Pick America's Pockets

Friday, Oct 03, 2008 - 12:30 AM

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By A. BARTON HINKLE

TIMES-DISPATCH COLUMNIST

So you leave the job site at the end of a hard day's work to find someone has stolen your truck. Great. Perfect. You borrow a phone and call the cops. While you're waiting for them to show up, you feel a tug and turn around to catch a pickpocket stealing your wallet.

"What's the big deal?" he says, sounding wounded. "You've got bigger problems to worry about, ain'tcha?"

That's essentially the argument being made by some congressmen and assorted other jaspers about the amount of pork in the latest omnibus spending bill: More than 2,300 appropriations for home-district projects, adding up to $6.6 billion in waste.

Pennsylvania Democrat John Murtha -- who seems to have scooped up the biggest pot of filthy lucre in the House -- says: Hey, it's nothing compared with "what the administration wants to bail out those rich guys in New York."

Gee, in that case, go right ahead! And while you're at it, take this watch!

PORK-BARREL projects do indeed account for only a tiny fraction of the nation's budget. The fact is fact owing more to the gargantuan size of the federal government than to the insignificance of the projects. Like a sliver in the eye, they cause great irritation not because they are large but because they lodge in a sensitive spot.

Here are just a few of the projects Congress believes Washington should be underwriting:

A $2-million study of "hibernation genomics" at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, courtesy of indicted GOP Sen. Ted Stevens. Stevens claims the title as reigning champ of pork-barrel politics once again this year, despite having to do a lot of the work during breaks in his trial on corruption charges. (No word on whether Sarah Palin was for this earmark before she was against it.)

$800,000 for the study of pseudofolliculitis barbae (that's razor bumps to you and me). The appropriation would go to a pharmaceutical company near St. Louis, Mo. -- which, by a remarka ble coincidence, is represented by the man sponsoring the earmark, Republican Sen. Kit Bond. The money would come out of the Defense Department budget. (Ammo? We don't need no stinkin' ammo!) A spokesman suggests Bond is motivated by concern for the well-being of minorities: "[P]seudofolliculitis barbae [is] a serious dermatological condition that disproportionately affects African-American and Hispanic men," she says -- the effect of which is to endanger national security by making it harder for them to wear gas masks and such.

$1.6 million for research on low-temperature vehicle performance at Wayne State University in Michigan, courtesy of Democratic Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan. Because, you understand, auto makers can't be expected to do their own research on vehicle performance.

$5 million for a sustainable-energy demonstration project for the Vermont National Guard, courtesy of the American military's No. 1 fan: Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.

$1.75 million for a Presidio Heritage Center, courtesy of Nancy Pelosi -- who also is seeking $1 million for a Military Intelligence Service Historic Learning Center and $1.75 million for "Expanding Access to Proven Lifestyle Modification Treatments Focused on Preventing and Reversing Chronic Diseases." Anything, that is, but actual military-type thingies soldiers might use to fight and stuff. Ick.

Congress occasionally vows to reform the earmark culture, but it never does. And congressmen who get called out about the earmarks they sponsor get positively shirty about the subject. They insist the line-item in question is (a) not pork because it funds (b) an extremely valuable endeavor that will (c) do a great deal of good.

ALL OF WHICH is (d) beside the point -- which concerns the propriety of Congress using general funds to benefit highly particularized interests regardless of whether the appropriation has anything to do with what the role of the federal government, properly understood, is.

Which is why it matters little whether the projects add up to 1 percent of the budget or 15 percent. It is not the size of the outlay that is in question, but the principle of the matter. A senator who will spend $1 million for, say, a Woodstock museum apparently believes there is no limit whatsoever on what the federal government may do. She seems to think the money was taken from the taxpayers not for limited and enumerated purposes, but for whatever use she might care to put it, as though it were hers to spend as she pleases.

At least a pickpocket understands it's not his wallet.

My thoughts do not aim for your assent -- just place them alongside your own reflections for a while.

--Robert Nozick.
Contact A. Barton Hinkle at (804) 649-6627 or bhinkle@timesdispatch.com.

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