Leading Dems defend slew of earmarks

Two leading congressional Democrats appeared to push back at President Obama on the controversial practice of earmarking, defending projects that Obama said may need to be sacrificed.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey (D-Wis.) stood by thousands of earmarks in the $410 billion omnibus spending bill on Wednesday, saying they would prefer lawmakers decide where the money goes instead of handing that task over to bureaucrats.

{mosads}”I’m proud of those earmarks, and everybody else who voted for them should be proud of them, too,” Obey said on the House floor.

“We cannot let spending be done by a bunch of nameless, faceless bureaucrats,” Reid said, arguing that lawmakers are much more in tune with federal money needs for their states than agencies in Washington.

Obama campaigned against excessive earmarking and demanded lawmakers keep member projects, as they are also known, out of the $787 billion stimulus.

Obama supported a ban on earmarks in the 2009 spending bill while he was a candidate for president. He told lawmakers in a joint session of Congress on Tuesday to make sacrifices so they can achieve long-term goals, including a reduction of the growing $1.2 trillion deficit.

“Given these realities, everyone in this chamber — Democrats and Republicans — will have to sacrifice some worthy priorities for which there are no dollars. And that includes me,” Obama said.

However, lawmakers have included nearly 9,000 earmarks in the package of spending bills that will fund the federal government for the rest of the fiscal year. House Minority Leader John Boehner (Ohio) and other Republicans have criticized the earmarks, which amount to nearly $4 billion in spending, as wasteful. Some 60 percent of the earmarks go to projects supported by Democrats, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense.

Obey, however, said attempts to kill the entire omnibus bill would be like eliminating the automobile because of a single drunk driver.

Obey said earmarks, placed in legislation by lawmakers as it’s crafted in committees and subcommittees, allow elected officials to shape the bill instead of appointees in the administration.

“Without the earmarking process, the White House and anonymous bureaucrats would make every single spending decision,” he said.

“Earmarking may have problems like every other human endeavor, but at least it’s out in the open, with a degree of accountability,” Obey added.