There are all sorts of outrages these days, from massive ones down to lil itty-bitty irritants. The screen-shots you see above are Google Earth representations of the congressional earmarks (those that are known) in this year's Defense Appropriations Bill.
And that, Gentle Reader, qualifies as one of the most egregious outrages to come down the pike since...um... last year's Defense Bill. To wit: 1,776 earmarks in the Defense Appropriations Bill, totaling some $1.8 billion. The final tally isn’t in yet, and I’ll bet that $1.8b figure is low. But the real kicker, for me, is this:
Even though members of Congress cut back their pork barrel spending this year, House lawmakers still tacked on to the military appropriations bill $1.8 billion to pay 580 private companies for projects the Pentagon did not request. (emphasis mine)
It’s very hard for me to express my anger and contempt in civil language. More to the point, just get the Google Earth plug-in and see if your blood pressure doesn’t elevate to alarming levels. Or maybe it’s not a good idea if you’re already on some sort of blood-pressure meds. If that’s the case, then stay away.
FWIW…it doesn’t look like my representative brought home the bacon. But I have NO idea if my senators are guilty or innocent, as the Senate doesn’t have the same sort of transparency (yeah, right) the House does. But you can bet your nether-regions an e-mail or two are going off to Ms. Bailey-Hutchison and Mr. Cornyn ASAP. Not that I expect an answer much beyond “thank you for your interest in…” But: ya gotta do what ya gotta do.
Wanna know if YOUR congresscritter was at the party with a lampshade on his/her head? Click here.
You can get the Earmarks “kml” file for Google Earth here. If you don’t have Google Earth, you can get it here.
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