Alan Simpson: “while I do not want to respond to this specific project, I do want to respond to what the gentleman from Arizona talked…”

“while I do not want to respond to this specific project, I do want to respond to what the gentleman from Arizona talked about just a little bit ago. He mentioned 10,000 earmarks and $29 billion last year. And he seeks to reduce the spending because somehow I guess the implication is that that $29 billion is wasteful spending. What that is is $29 billion that Congress has directed how it is going to be spent and not the administration. When the administration proposes a budget, it is a recommendation that comes to Congress. It is full of earmarks. Administration earmarks. Earmarks that they believe how the money should be spent. Congress in their budget process, in their hearing process, in the Appropriations Committee make certain determinations. Some of them, in fact, most of them are that the administration's requests are appropriate. Sometimes we disagree with them. We say spending ought to be done somewhere else. We have different priorities. Those are called earmarks. I call them congressionally directed spending. To tell you the truth, I wish we congressionally directed all of the spending. Remember, the President just makes recommendations. It is this Congress's responsibility to determine where the spending is going to go and to tell an administration or an agency that some of this money, a very, very small percentage of it is going to be spent in certain projects that we think are important, at least a majority here do, I think is our role.…”