On the recordJuly 18, 2012
I want to say this. While we all acknowledge there was a numerical explosion and a substantive explosion or a questionable, in substance, on earmarks and that's why earmarks are banned, one of the advantages of earmarks is that it did let the small mom-and-pop innovative small businesses have a crack at the bat at the Pentagon budget. And most of us who are familiar with the Pentagon budget would say it's broken or at least it needs lots of improvement. What the earmarking did do is let small companies have a bite at the apple. So in the interest of banning earmarks, we set up this program to allow small businesses. I want to give you a graphic example. I had a man come to me one time and said, I used to work with a large defense contractor. He named the contractor and I don't want to name them. But he said, This is a circuit panel. In fact, it's a memory panel. It's about the size of this notebook in my hand. And he said, This is for a nuclear submarine, and it costs about $10 million. I know because I invented it when I was with the large defense contractor. And all nuclear submarines now buy this kind of memory board. But your cell phone--pulling out the BlackBerry--now has more memory in it than that big, awkward panel. But the only way I'm going to get a crack at the business with the U.S. Navy would be through the earmarking process. Now, I can replace this $10 million circuit memory board for probably hundreds of thousands of dollars, but I can't do that now.…
