Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I rise today to talk about a problem that, despite a congressional ban on the practice, continues to plague our budget. That problem is earmarks. Back in 1986--just a little history lesson here--as Congress engaged in a last-minute scramble to fund the government, a Republican Congressman from Pennsylvania slipped an earmark into a massive spending bill. He turned a small exhibit of steam-powered trains, known as Steamtown USA, into a national park. Three decades, nearly $100 million, and one congressional earmark ban later, that project continues to cost taxpayers millions of dollars annually. The bridge to nowhere, the North Carolina teapot museum, the indoor rainforest in Iowa, and, yes, Steamtown USA, are among the many egregious earmarks that led fed-up taxpayers to press for a ban on this kind of spending. Like triceratops and velociraptors, earmarks that were declared extinct, fossilized relics of a bygone era, are somehow making a reappearance. What taxpayers and many in Congress didn't realize is that despite the successful ban on earmarks, we are still paying millions of dollars for the old ones. Through unexpended funds, carve-outs in the Tax Code, and grant awards, spending on past earmark projects and their recipients still roam the Federal budget landscape. Today, I am releasing a report--``Jurassic Pork''--which will highlight the fossilized pork projects that are still embedded or buried deep in the Federal budget.…”