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BErmrfrPrvCmp
Jake Grumbach, Columbia Universiy
By banning earmarks to private companies, we can spend our tax dollarsmore wisely and curb budget corruption.
Congress and he Presiden use earmarks o direc ederal spending o projecs;hey are added o legislaive bills or heir commitee repors. For example, a con-gressman could add an earmark o a bill o und hospials or a new ambulanceor heir disric.In 2001, Senaor Slade Goron(R-WA) helped earmark $8 mil-lion or he developmen o he“Nomad,” a small opical deviceproduced by Seatle’s MicrovisionCorporaion ha connecs o sol-diers’ helmes, displaying acicalposiions in heir elds o vision. In2004, afer receiving ve separae$1000 donaions rom Microvisionexecuives, Senaor Paty Murray(D-WA) earmarked $5.5 millionor Nomads. By ha ime SenaorGoron had lef governmen and joined he Microvision board. Senaor Murray would earmark anoher $6 millionor Nomads in 2005, even afer a compeing rm wih similar devices won anArmy eld es.Like all earmarks, hose orhe Nomad devices are com-pleely permissible i he de-vices were used. However, aswih many earmarked iems,he Nomad was scrapped byhe Army, which said he de-vices caused more harm hangood (hey were disracingand caused a blind spo orsoldiers). In oal, he deviceae up a oal o $19.5 mil-lion ax dollars - $6 million owhich came afer he device
Key Facts
The 2008 ederal budge included $18.3
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billion in earmarks or a oal o 11,780 proj-ecs; $3.5 billion had no ideniable spon-sor atached.These earmarks represen a signican de-
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crease since 2005, bu sill well below heDemocraic Congress’ pledge o reduceearmark spending by 50 percen.A number o congressmen have racked
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over $100 million in earmarks; some sena-ors have earmarked over $400 million.Senaor Cochran (R-MS) has earmarked aoal o $837,256,500 since aking oce.
Talking Points
A sysem ha allows earmarks o privae com-
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panies is ripe or biparisan abuse, especiallyin deense appropriaions - poliicians can cor-ruply earmark ax dollars or privae compa-nies ha conribue o heir campaigns.Making privae companies bid or governmen
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conracs in he classic procuremen sysemwould drive down coss and avoid unneces-sary pork projecs.Reorms o disclose earmark spending and
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hold eleced ocials accounable have provenineecive. Poliicians have used counlessloopholes o keep earmark disclosure secre-ive, unspecic, and convolued.
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