Shocker: Ron Paul, The Much Heralded “Only True Conservative,” Has Most Earmarks In Spending Bill

• March 12, 2009

More earmarks than any other Republican.

Ron Paul, the Texas congressman who is the darling of the Libertarian Right, has more earmarks in the pork-laden $410-billion spending bill than any other Republican.
That’s not according to the MSM, or the liberal blogosphere. That’s what Fox News is reporting.
In an interview Tuesday night with Fox News’ Neil Cavuto, Paul not only defended his own earmarks, he argued that every penny in the federal budget should be earmarked, to improve transparency.

Here’s the video of Paul with Cavuto:

It’s a bit amazing to hear Paul defend his earmarking as “transparent.” From what we’ve seen from the earmarking process over the last several years, the biggest problem with it isn’t so much that every single project funded is bad but rather that the whole process is such a departure from transparency and accountability as to lead to all sorts of problems with corruption and quid pro quo arrangements.
Paul’s assertion that earmarks are more transparent is just plain nonsense.
And I thought that Paul was supposed to be a strict federalist. Porking up local districts with lots and lots of federal money is hardly in keeping with federalist principle.
I don’t doubt that the Ron Paul faithful, who are every bit as devout in their worship of Paul as Obama’s liberal disciples are of him, will eat up Paul’s spin and continue to defend him just as they always casually forget the fact that he takes money from Nazis and doesn’t return it or even apologize for it, or that he panders to 9/11 conspiracy theorists.
Because when a political leader is elevated to the level of idolatry that Paul enjoys from some, it stops mattering what that leader actually does. Because what he does, for his fawning supporters, is inherently right.

Tags: Asshats, Domestic Issues, Politics

http://Array carrick

Rob:

Paul’s assertion that earmarks are more transparent is just plain nonsense.

I don’t think either mechanism guarantees transparency.

Question: Which of these is more transparent:

An earmark specifying money for a monorail from Anaheim to Las Vegas

Or:

A spending bill authorizing the expenditure on an unspecified monorail (but where the parameters have been defined so that only a monorail from Anaheim to Las Vegas qualifies).
carrick

Rob:

Hey, now, I know you and I disagree in part on earmarks but what we’re talking about here is Ron Paul being a flaming hypocrite.

Difference on this matter aside, let’s at least be clear on that point.

No argument there, other than in choice of language.

When Ron Paul attacks earmarks, he’s engaging in demagoguery and not just hypocrisy.

That is, his stance on earmarks is “a political strategy for gaining political power by appealing to the popular prejudices, emotions, fears and expectations of the public.” (Wikipedia definition.)
jimmypop

For me the Ron Paul core are about like being the Dino of Republicans.

so which liberal did you vote for last election?
carrick

And by the way, I think John McCain is either an idiot, a socialist or guilty of the same form of populist polictics as Ron Paul is.

Regarding what Rob and I agree/disagree on:

I’ve always advocated that earmark spending should be transparent, and the recipients of the actual expenditures be accountable, and that any conflicts of interest be spelled out up front.

Accountability in spending is a lot easier to do if you have a budget that specifies how the money is spent.

The trouble is that not all earmarks follow “normal accounting procedures”, and the rules in congress needs to be changed so that they do.

Back-door earmarks, like the train to Las Vegas, go the opposite way. Eliminate earmarks and all you’ve done is corrupted the process even more.
Brent

Even if you think Paul is making appropriate earmarks, and that’s debatable

But he doesn’t say he thinks the spending is okay. He admitted he votes against the entire spending bills because he thinks the federal government is overstepping its bounds and wasting resources in doing so – including those projects in his district. At the very least, that’s being honest about it.

And then there’s the question of how much federal money it’s appropriate to spend at the state level.

If you listen to the video you posted, he answers that question. He doesn’t think money should be taken by DC and then doled back out to the states by the feds.

there’s hardly anything transparent about the earmark process.

That’s true. It’s also true that the problem exists with all the bills congress passes and it’s because they are spending $4 trillion per year. How can that kind of spending ever be compatible with transparency?
Brent

That’s really silly, Rob. You should agree that virtually everything should be earmarked by Congress instead of throwing money at the executive branch and its bureaucrats for them to decide how to spend.

That process is precisely what we advocate for at the state level, but it is thought by some to be “impractical” at the federal level. Yet, it is only “impractical” at the federal level because they are spending over $4 trillion a year now — if the federal government was following the constitution (i.e., it was much, much smaller) congress could actually scrutinize the spending decisions like the constitution authorizes.

Anyway, Paul is right to vote against all these spending bills. They are absurdly bloated and wasteful. Representatives in congress specifying where the wasted funds are spent is hardly the problem — the whole ideology of big government in charge of all those resources is where our problems begin and end.
Brent

I hear the phrase “Don’t Let the Perfect be the Enemy of the Good” a lot around here, yet consistently voting against the spending bills and entitlements (no matter who is president or in control of congress) is ignored because we must criticize the one (and perhaps only?) process that is at least constitutional — congressional earmarking.
Brent

Apparently some people think it’s better for the Congress as a whole to dictate how federal dollars get spent within his state. Having the federal government dictate our lives is usually a Democratic platform.

I guess I don’t understand this comment. There may be 420+ members of the House who believe that the federal government should fund state projects, but Rep. Paul is among the very tiny minority who don’t hold that view. Rather, the question at hand is whether the executive branch or the congress is going to waste money.

Another point of view is to ask whether it is fair to ask conservative members of the House to have to vote against all discretionary federal spending in their districts (knowing full well that their constituents will pay the exact same amount in taxes, while all the money gets poured into other districts)? This sounds like the typical liberal democrat argument that conservatives are hypocrites because they use government-built roads or government-mandated sidewalks. It’s a non sequitur.
carrick

Brent:

That’s really silly, Rob. You should agree that virtually everything should be earmarked by Congress instead of throwing money at the executive branch and its bureaucrats for them to decide how to spend.

Apparently some people think it’s better for the Congress as a whole to dictate how federal dollars get spent within his state. Having the federal government dictate our lives is usually a Democratic platform.
J.Kru

If a guy steals your wallet, but then gives you $2 back so you can catch a bus ride home, do you refuse it because he never should have taken your wallet in the first place?

Ron Paul is one of the few without his head completely up his arse.
http://www.dartemis.net/blog/ sayanything-42

Rob,

Just another case of do what I say not what I do.
jimmypop

the video is gone… id like to hear what he says.

regardless, i am big time disappointed in Paul for taking anything. i also agree with the logic that every single dollar have a SPECIFIC destination (tons of detail and accountability is a good thing at these dollar amounts) to ensure we as tax payers know where, when and to who every penny went. And this info should be easily accessible be anyone that cares to ask. HOWEVER…..the problem is that way, way too much goes to pet projects to begin with.

and yes, i still like him better than 99% of the repubs out there.
jimmypop

The trouble is that not all earmarks follow “normal accounting procedures”, and the rules in congress needs to be changed so that they do.

EXACTLY! ive worked on jobs with government grant monies involved. the client always seem to whine when it comes to all the loads of red tape and paper work involved. every time is say, ‘ this is MY money you are spending. it should be darn hard to get it.’ i dont have many fans….. ive also see things like ‘empowerment zones’ that require almost nothing to get money and less work to spend it. that crap really pisses me off.

there is one group i almost worked with in the past that got a grant of $75000 (might have been $100K but they have whittled it down) and they never really did anything with it as they proposed they were going to do in the grant proposal. so, they just sit on it and draw cash every year for various little projects… its like their personal trust fund. not sure if that legal (the ‘accounting system’ is a notebook and some papers a greasy old farmer has…… our tax dollars…. super….) or what but its been YEARS.
Michael

Not sure if it was mentioned here, but the money has already been allocated. It’s already been spent/printed/borrowed. It is going to be deposited in the Treasury one way or another…

So, Ron Paul earmarks his portion, then votes against the bill and he’s a hypocrite?

If only the other congressmen were hypocrites like Ron Paul…
robert108

I think the entire MSM-created demonization of earmarks is just a distraction from the exponentially larger problem of wasteful govt social spending. Ron Paul is a loon, btw.
2Hotel9

If all this spending is just so damned important why do they not submit each piece for debate in the public forum of the US Congress? Why are they hiding this shit from the American people? Why are they doing this without debate, or even reading what they are passing? And why are so many people just simply ecstatic that their elected reps are doing all this to them, while telling them to be silent, refusing to answer their phones/mail and flat out doing the exact OPPOSITE of what the people who elected them are ordering them to do?
Tim

I would compare this to paying personal income taxes:
1. I pay 40% of my income in taxes throughout the year.
2. I file tax returns, requesting 1% of that amount back, following the same laws as everyone else.
3. I vote for candidates in favor of lowering taxes and spending.

So then doing both #2 and #3 would make me a hyprocrite? So the non-hypocritical way would be to refuse the refund and send the money back?

I’ll admit I certainly am a hyprocrite because I do things I don’t agree with, like paying taxes that help perpetuate destructive policies. If I were not a hypocrite I would be in jail by now, so I live with that paradox.

I also can’t stand Wendy’s food, but I’ll eat it if my wife and son want to go there. I’m hypocritical there too. Such is life.
http://www.dartemis.net/blog/ sayanything-42

LuapNor, now with even more pig lips and hips!
http://ndgoon.blogspot.com/ goon

Ron Paul, the Texas congressman who is the darling of the Libertarian Right, has more earmarks in the pork-laden $410-billion spending bill than any other Republican.

Doh…
2Hotel9

Ah, no, Luap Nor has his head firmly up his ass, and always has.
http://suitepotato.blogspot.com/ sayanything-4808

What’s to argue over? He’s got the mental stability and appearance of Timothy Leary and a set of politics that would be Doc Kevorkian if the Republican Party let him get his foot out of the outhouse door.

We’re taking him seriously why? Because some of the black helicopter new world order everything is a conspiracy let me tell you about the Trilateral Commission people have seeped into the party along the edges of the big tent following the Lyndon LaRouch slime trail and they like him?

For me the Ron Paul core are about like being the Dino of Republicans.
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

So Ron Paul doesn’t like the federal money going to his district, and he votes against the spending bills knowing full well they’ll pass anyway, so he stuffs the bills full of earmarks because…what the hell?

Sounds like a hypocrite to me.
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

I don’t disagree, Carrick. But I’m responding narrowly to Paul’s comments. He’s trying to defend his hypocrisy by saying that earmarking is more transparent. It’s not, really, as you yourself indicate.

What’s more, Paul claims that he’s against federal money flowing into these local districts and yet he earmarks federal money anyway.

That’s what people call a “hypocrite.” And I’m saying that from the perspective of not all earmarks being necessarily evil.
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

Not sure if it was mentioned here, but the money has already been allocated. It’s already been spent/printed/borrowed. It is going to be deposited in the Treasury one way or another…

So, Ron Paul earmarks his portion, then votes against the bill and he’s a hypocrite?

If you say you’re against government waste, and that you’re against federal spending on the local level, and then you earmark wasteful spending at the federal level that does, in fact, make you a hypocrite.

My goodness but I wish Ron Paul conservatives were more intellectually honest than Obama liberals. At least have the courage to criticize your guy when he’s wrong.
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

This sounds like the typical liberal democrat argument that conservatives are hypocrites because they use government-built roads or government-mandated sidewalks. It’s a non sequitur.

No, what we’re talking about is Ron Paul saying one thing and doing another. The pork train is convenient for him politically, so it’s ok. Apparently.

I wish that your opinion on this were based on principle, and not the defense of a political idol. I mean, during the primary process I had to suffer hordes of Ron Paul idiots swamping my comments section every time I mentioned the right-wing Obama with nonsense about how Ron Paul is the only true conservative and people like Fred Thompson suck because he did something stupid like voted for McCain/Feingold (something he later apologized for).

But now that Ron Paul is not only imperfect, but a flaming hypocrite to boot, the Ron Paul hordes can’t be honest enough to criticize their own guy.

Sorry, Brent, but Ron Paul is a hypocrite. And he’d make a horrible leader.

Carrick, I really don’t see where you and I disagree on anything. Frankly, I wish all spending were directly earmarked and voted on case-by-case. Or as close to that as conceivably possible. Because I think there are some legiitimate instances of earmarked money (roads, bridges, etc.)

What irks me is a sanctimonious poser like Ron Paul getting all self-righteous about he’s the only man in Congress courageous enough to vote no on all this stuff, and then he porks the hell out of the spending bill.

Hypocrisy, pure and simple.
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

And by the way, I think John McCain is either an idiot, a socialist or guilty of the same form of populist polictics as Ron Paul is.

Agreed.
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

Apparently some people think it’s better for the Congress as a whole to dictate how federal dollars get spent within his state. Having the federal government dictate our lives is usually a Democratic platform.

Hey, now, I know you and I disagree in part on earmarks but what we’re talking about here is Ron Paul being a flaming hypocrite.

Difference on this matter aside, let’s at least be clear on that point.
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

I don’t think it’s silly at all. Even if you think Paul is making appropriate earmarks, and that’s debatable, there’s hardly anything transparent about the earmark process.

And then there’s the question of how much federal money it’s appropriate to spend at the state level.

Just because Ron Paul does it doesn’t mean its ok.

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Shocker: Ron Paul, The Much Heralded “Only True Conservative,” Has Most Earmarks In Spending Bill

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