Issue Position: Earmarks and Pork

Issue Position

Earmarks and Pork

About the time the Senate voted on the healthcare bill, Harry Reid said if any Senator didn't get something out of that bill for their State then they weren't doing their job well. It seems Mr. Reid, along with most of our Legislators have gotten the idea their role in government is to see how much of our money they can bring back to their State, with no concern as to its source.

Members of Congress, on both sides of the aisle and in both Houses, have used tax dollars to fund their own little projects for decades. That's bad enough, but now they spend our hard-earned money to buy one another's vote. Adding language to a bill that sends money to a specific State, like Louisiana, or that excludes a State from a spending mandate, such as Nebraska, is nothing less than theft. Inasmuch as the bill I mention increases our debt, it's literally stealing from children--our children.

Fixing Omnibus Spending in 2016

We need a Constitutional Amendment requiring cash expenditures to be voted on line-by-line. For example, all in favor of picking up the tab for Nebraska's share in this really expensive healthcare plan, signify by saying, "Aye." Everyone in favor of sending 300 million dollars to Louisiana in exchange for her vote, signify by saying, "Aye."

I suggest there be no such thing as an omnibus spending bill. If Congress stopped wasting time on baseball, steroids and the amount of water it takes to flush a toilet, they'd have plenty of time for line-by-line spending. This idea solves a problem that wouldn't exist if our government worked from the bottom up, as it was intended. There just aren't that many things the federal government should be spending on.

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