http://www.americanprogressaction.or..._earmarks.html


Sarah Palin, John McCain, and Earmarks

By Scott Lilly

September 4, 2008

The truth is out. Sarah Palin may have posed as an opponent of
congressionally mandated earmarks, but when the slop was in the
bucket, she was one of the first at Senator Ted Stevens’ (R-AK)
trough.

The Seattle Times reported yesterday that she submitted 31 earmark
requests totaling $197 million in the current (FY2009) budget cycle.
According to that paper, it was “more, per person, than any other
state.”

The Washington Post reports that in 2000, Palin took an extraordinary
step as the mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, a town that had fewer than 5,500
residents—she hired a Washington lobbyist to seek congressional
earmarks. According to the Post, she won a total of $6.1 million in
earmarks for the city of Wasilla in 2002.

A review of the Taxpayers for Common Sense database from which the
Post derived that number indicates that 2002 was actually a subpar
year for Palin. Over the course of her four years she sought earmarks
as city mayor and won an average of $6.7 million a year.

Both numbers need to be placed in some perspective. Fiscal year 2008
was the first year for which there was a complete listing of all
earmarks contained in all appropriation bills. That information was
loaded into several databases, including the one developed by
Taxpayers for Common Sense. According to that data, the average state
got about $50 per person in earmarked funds in 2008. Alaska,
represented by Ted Stevens, the Senate’s earmarker-in-chief, got $506
per person—about 10 times the national average. Wasilla between 2000
and 2003 was getting well over $1,000 per person—twice the Alaska
state average in 2008.

There is nothing particularly wrong with any of these actions. Yet
Palin has advertised herself as a reformer and a skeptic of earmarking
while maneuvering to become the earmark queen of the earmark state.
The energy she has put into finding resources to help solve problems
in her hometown and her state is admirable. She didn’t create the
rules about how federal money is distributed—by competitive grants,
formulas, or congressional earmarks—but once the rules were in place,
she used them to the maximum advantage of those she was elected to
represent.

That creates an odd juxtaposition between her and the man with whom
she shares the ticket. Unlike most of his colleagues in Congress, Sen.
John McCain (R-AZ) has not only tried to change the rules governing
the use of earmarks—he has refused to pursue them on behalf of needy
constituencies he was elected to defend even when it was clear that
the rules would not be changed and millions of dollars that might go
to Arizona would be headed to other parts of the country.

While Sara Palin’s constituents in Wasilla were getting about 20 times
the national average in earmarked federal funding, McCain’s
constituents in Arizona were getting less than half the national
average. The data indicates that if Arizona had matched the national
average, the state would have, in the current fiscal year, received
more than $133 million dollars in additional federal investments in
schools, hospitals, roads, and so forth. In fact, the database
indicates that Arizona rates dead last among the 50 states in per
capita earmarked funds at $18.70 per person. This is despite the best
efforts of Senator Jon Kyl (R-AZ), who is also an opponent of the
earmarking process, but unwilling to give up earmarked funds to other
states just to protect rhetorical high ground.

A review of the earmarks that Kyl and others in the delegation brought
home to Arizona in 2008 tells an interesting story. Kyl reached across
the aisle to help Congressman Raul Grijalva (D-AZ) with a project for
the community of Nogales, Arizona—a project intended to resolve a long
festering safety and public health issue.

Nogales is a town of about 20,000, or roughly three times the size of
Wasilla, but a third of the residents live in poverty compared to 12
percent nationally and 10 percent in Wasilla. Overall, per capita
income in Nogales is about a third of the national average. But
perhaps the biggest problem facing Nogales is its geography. It is one
of the few places on the U.S.-Mexican border where the watershed flows
north, and when tropical storms from the Pacific Ocean come raging
across the Sonoran dessert as they do every couple of years. Nogales,
Arizona, is inundated not only in water but animal waste, raw sewage,
and debris from Mexico.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has worked with the U.S. Geological
Survey and the Environmental Protection Agency to develop a flood
control plan for Nogales, but no money has been included in recent
presidential budgets for such an effort. Kyl and Grijalva’s efforts
added $4.6 million to the FY2008 budget to begin to address this
critical need.

Kyl also worked with fellow Republican Rick Renzi (R-AZ) to add
$750,000 to the Transportation and Housing Appropriation bill to
repair a road on the Navajo Reservation running from Hardrock to
Pinon. The current quality of the road is so poor that it is often
impassible in winter months, residents are cut off from the outside
world, and food and medical supplies must be airlifted to avert
starvation.

This is not to say that everything that Kyl or others in the Arizona
delegation do with respect to earmarking is perfect or even laudable.
I am certain they directed funds at less urgent needs. But it does
demonstrate that Arizona, like many states, has communities that
desperately need help, and that McCain, unlike his running mate, has
had the power to help those communities and has refused to do so. That
is a rather remarkable decision, even if it makes one’s campaign
message a little crisper. Perhaps there are things that John McCain
can learn from Sara Palin during the course of the coming campaign.
© Center for American Progress Action Fund

"She didn’t create the rules about how federal money is distributed—by
competitive grants,
formulas, or congressional earmarks—but once the rules were in place,
she used them to the maximum advantage of those she was elected to
represent."

She sounds like one smart cookie. Certainly not a lightweight soccer
mom, as others are trying to say. McCain made a wide choice.

The Dims are going down in November.

On Thu, 04 Sep 2008 14:09:40 -0400, hk wrote:

http://www.americanprogressaction.or..._earmarks.html


Sarah Palin, John McCain, and Earmarks

To be fair, her constituency was different. If the Feds want to give out
the pork, as a mayor or a governor, you would be a fool not to take it.
However, she could be a little more honest about it. Eventually, she may
have said no to the "bridge to nowhere" but she didn't say no to the
money.

wrote:
On Thu, 04 Sep 2008 14:09:40 -0400, hk wrote:

http://www.americanprogressaction.or..._earmarks.html


Sarah Palin, John McCain, and Earmarks

To be fair, her constituency was different. If the Feds want to give out
the pork, as a mayor or a governor, you would be a fool not to take it.
However, she could be a little more honest about it. Eventually, she may
have said no to the "bridge to nowhere" but she didn't say no to the
money.



So, she was *for* earmarks until she decided it would be better to say
she was against them? :)

On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 06:17:59 -0500, wrote:

On Thu, 04 Sep 2008 14:09:40 -0400, hk wrote:

http://www.americanprogressaction.or..._earmarks.html


Sarah Palin, John McCain, and Earmarks

To be fair, her constituency was different. If the Feds want to give out
the pork, as a mayor or a governor, you would be a fool not to take it.
However, she could be a little more honest about it. Eventually, she may
have said no to the "bridge to nowhere" but she didn't say no to the
money.

She was for the Bridge toi Nowhere until it became the national symbol
for government gone crazy. Then she was against it. Any way the wind
blows, I guess...