John McCain is Right!

Well, I just have to say I wholeheartedly agree with John McCain when he says that Congress is “disconnected” from Americans.

Congress has lived up to there reputation of self interest and voted down the earmark spending ban co-introduced by Senator McCain. This bill would have ended earmark spending for 1 year. Instead, members of the Senate decided they couldn’t do without pork-barrel spending for even 1 year. Only 29 members voted for the bill while 71 voted against the will of the American people to maintain the wasteful, pork laden, special interest spending of our tax dollars.

Of the 29 who voted in favor, only 6 were Democrats but it included both Obama and Clinton. How ironic that both of them are two of the biggest users of earmark spending. Mrs. Clinton received $342 MILLION in earmark spending last year alone which ranks her the 10^th largest spender in the Senate. Obama got $98 MILLION for special interests in his state for fiscal year 2008 and requested $330 MILLION in fiscal year 2007.

For those of you that are reading this and you don’t know what “earmark spending” is, it’s basically a request by a Senator for federal tax money to go to some project or industry within that Senator’s state. In most instances, these projects should be paid for by the people of the state that reaps the benefits and NOT by federal tax money.

Since a bill for the spending would have to go through the normal process and probably wouldn’t have the merit to stand on it’s own and get passed, they attach it as a rider onto a piece of legislation (oftentimes totally unrelated to the earmark) that has a good chance of passing so when it does, their spending gets passed right along with it. Sort of like a Remora that attaches itself to a shark. It takes advantage of the shark’s skill to get food. The rider depends on the bigger bill to get passed but it’s our taxpayer dollars that they are feeding on.

Congress feeds on tax dollars and Obama and Clinton are some of the biggest gluttons at the trough. So why did they vote for the bill that would ban earmark spending for a year? Did they change their minds? NOT ON YOUR LIFE. The reason is very simple - they are trying to get the nomination for President. They realize that if they voted against it, it wouldn’t look good to the voters. So why did they suck so much from the trough before? Because they were already elected to the Senate and part of the “tax and spend” mentality that the Democrats subscribe to.

Last year, Congress passed 12,884 earmarks to the tune of more that $18 BILLION. Yes, that Billion with a B… that’s 18,000 million of your tax dollars being spent by these clowns.

Friends, I am here to tell you that this system is broken. We need to do something about it. We need to vote these fat-cats out of office and start voting for people that will fix the problem.

1. We need to ban earmark, pork-barrel spending.
2. We need to end the lobbyist system of influence in Washington.
3. We need the line item veto.

Just so you know, John McCain wasn’t my first choice for the Republican nomination but you know what?

He has NEVER requested an earmark for his state.

That shows me he not only talks the talk, he walks the walk.

Right now, he has my vote.