Jeff Flake: “one of my astute colleagues recently said, ``One of the toughest parts of being a Member of Congress is remembering what…”

“one of my astute colleagues recently said, ``One of the toughest parts of being a Member of Congress is remembering what we are supposed to be outraged about.'' I thought about this yesterday when I heard the report that surprise, surprise, earmarks were being used to help Members get reelected. The reason that is treated with kind of a ho-hum is because, as it turns out, that is one of the more noble explanations as to why earmarks are used. With the reporting that is going on about earmarks being tied to campaign contributions, or chairmen, or people in leadership positions getting tens of millions of dollars in earmarks for favored companies or organizations in their district, it seems that we have simply gone too far when we don't recognize this as a problem. I would call on my colleagues in the new year to have a moratorium on earmarks. Let's put a brake on this process until we can put a process in place to adequately vet these. There is no noble purpose for the contemporary practice of earmarking. Try as we might, we aren't coming up with one.”