Today both the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times ran stories about the pork-filled emergency supplemental bill that contains Sen. Trent Lott's (R-MS) now infamous "Magic Railroad". Some congressmen and Senators are not happy with the $15 billion worth of extra picnic shoulders thrown into a bill that is intended to provide funds for rebuilding New Orleans, the Gulf Coast, and Iraq. Tim Chapman at the Capitol Report writes that both Mike Pence (R-IN) and Jeff Flake (R-AZ) have called on the President to veto the bill if the extra money is not removed. Pence called the bill a "fruit basket" of unrelated spending. John Spratt (D-SC), the ranking Dem on the House Budget Committee, said, "A lot of these things are desirable, and some are even necessary, but they don't belong in an emergency spending bill."
I haven't been by the Capitol lately but I've heard they're hanging this new sign out front:
Family Favor Factory:
Looks like Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) has been giving his staffers a bit too much leeway in writing earmarks. USA Today reports on Specter's family affair:
Sen. Arlen Specter obtained a $200,000 grant last year for a Philadelphia foundation represented by the son of one of Specter's top aides,the latest example of how the Pennsylvania Republican has helped clients of lobbyists related to members of his staff. Bill Reynolds, Specter's chief of staff, said an investigation found two lobbyists who sought financial favors and who were related to staff members. Specter has changed his office rules to ban lobbying by staffers' relatives.It's good to see that he's implemented new rules to stop this legal, but highly questionable, behavior from continuing. Continue reading
Democrat Faces FBI Scrutiny:
The senior Democrat who recently stepped down from the Ethics Committee, Alan Mollohan (D-WV), is under scrutiny from the FBI in both West Virginia and Washington for possibly steering federal money to projects that financially benefitted him. Raw Story reports on a Wall Street Journal article that details the new direction of this probe:
Rep. Alan B. Mollohan (D-WV)bought a 300-acre farm with the head of a small defense contractor that had won a $2.1 million contract from funds that the congressman added to a 2005 spending bill last year. The joint purchase of the farm, which sits on the Cheat River in West Virginia, is the most direct tie yet disclosed between Rep. Mollohan and a beneficiary of the federal spending he has steered toward his home state. It raises new questions about possible conflicts of interest by Rep. Mollohan and his use of such spending.For future appropriating congressmen: Don't jointly purchase any property with recipients of your federal earmarks on Cheat River. Continue reading
Prioritizing pork
The Washington Post has a story today, by Jonathan Weisman, about Rep. Charles H. Taylor, R-N.C., and his efforts to block funding for what could add up to being a $60 million tab for building a memorial to Flight 93, which crashed in a central Pennsylvania field after a group of passengers rushed the cockpit to wrestle control of the plane from the al Qaeda hijackers:
But for three years, that field has made do with a makeshift monument while one member of Congress, Rep. Charles H. Taylor (R-N.C.), has blocked a $10 million request to buy the land for a permanent memorial to the 40 passengers and crew members who overpowered hijackers bent on crashing their jet into the Capitol or the White House.... Continue reading
Mr. Barbour Goes (Back) To Washington:
Tim Chapman at Porkbusters writes that good ole boy ex-lobbyist and Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour (R) is off to Washington to fight for Trent Lott's Magic Railroad:
Barbour, the former RNC Chairman and top DC lobbyist turned Governor is rumored to make an appearance tomorrow at the weekly Senate Republican policy lunch. The Governor is in town to provide much needed support to his Mississippi Senators Thad Cochran and Trent Lott, who are both under fire for securing the largest earmark ever.
I believe that Barbour will use this image to show other members of Congress the merits of the railroad.
RISDY Damaged in Hurricane Katrina?
Why is the Rhode Island School of Design getting federal dollars from an emergency spending bill aimed at repairing damage in the Hurricane Katrina ravaged Gulf Coast? The Washington Times looks at the issue:
A supplemental spending bill for the war in Iraq and hurricane recovery passed the House of Representatives last month calling for $92 billion in federal spending. The Senate added $14 billion for hurricane relief, and another $10 billion in unrelated spending in amendments to be debated when Congress returns this week. Because of the differences in the two spending packages, the bill then will go to a conference committee before final votes in both chambers.Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) and Rep. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) are two lawmakers that are outraged by the unrelated spending. Flake provides his interpretation: ""Unfortunately, too many members of Congress have gotten into the practice of responding to a disaster not by asking 'What can I do to help?' but instead asking 'What's in it for me?'?" Meanwhile, Think Progress has the story on one of these unnecessary earmarks added by Mississippi Senator Thad Cochran (R). Continue reading
New York Times Editorial:
The New York Times has joined the chorus decrying Trent Lott's Magic Railroad:
Invoked in the name of public safety, the project is actually a transparent attempt to tap already scarce hurricane reconstruction funds so the rail bed can be replaced by a touristy "beach boulevard" long sought by Mississippi to aid the casino industry and coastal developers. The railroad relocation dwarfs the $223 million "bridge to nowhere" proposed for the Alaska outback, the giveaway that brought all the vows for reform from Congress. Even worse, Senator Lott and his fellow Mississippi Republican, Thad Cochran, are attaching this frivolous add-on to a bill that is supposed to be used to pay for emergencies — specifically the war in Iraq and hurricane reconstruction. Senator Lott angrily resents any description of his pet project as a right of way to the slot machines. He insists the rail line needs higher ground and his constituents better protection. But it seems clear the twin traumas of Iraq and Katrina are being used as cover. Economic development is a fine goal for the Gulf Coast, but it deserves careful consideration, not a devious rush to the pork barrel.Sounds about right to me. Continue reading
Trent and the Magic Railroad:
The anti-porkers are ganging up on Sen. Trent Lott (R-MS) like he's Don Young. There's now a website solely devoted to the "railroad to nowhere", or as my colleague Bill Allison has called it, the "reoriented express". Tim Chapman at Townhall.com and Porkbusters is hammering away at Lott and congressional Republicans:
The latest example, which you have heard of by now, puts Don Young’s (R-AK) Bridge to Nowhere to shame. This pork project, secured by Mississippi Republican Senators Trent Lott and Thad Cochran, is more than double the cost of the bridge. Weighing in at $700 million, the funding secured to scrap a coastal rail line in Mississippi and move it inland (thereby making room for coastal developers) is by far the largest congressional earmark ever secured. Not only is the project exorbitantly expensive, it would appear to be unnecessary. The Mississippi senators tucked the project away in the massive “emergency” supplemental bill slated to be considered by the Senate next week. The funding for the CSX rail line was designated as “emergency” funding in the document, which reads, “As a result of Hurricane Katrina, the rail line was out of commission for 143 days and has since reopened only on a temporary basis.”For full coverage of "Trent and the Magic Railroad" go to the Heritage Policy Blogs (h/t Instapundit) or go down the hall to Allison's Under the Influence. Continue reading
Reoriented Express:
Today the Washington Post picked up the "Reoriented Express" story that Bill Allison has been covering down the hall at Under the Influence. Mississippi's Senators Trent Lott (R) and Thad Cochran (R) inserted an earmarked provision to relocate a Gulf Coast railroad that had recently been destroyed and then rebuilt further north to make way for a highway. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), who doesn't mind knocking heads with members of his own party, is in his typical state of outrage at government waste, "It is ludicrous for the Senate to spend $700 million to destroy and relocate a rail line that is in perfect working order, particularly when it recently underwent a $250 million repair ... American taxpayers are generous and are happy to restore damaged property, but it is wrong for senators to turn this tragedy into a giveaway for economic developers." As always you can find out why the railroad is being relocated if you just follow the money. As the Post notes:
For more than half a dozen years, Mississippi officials, development planners and tourism authorities have dreamed of the complex restructuring of Mississippi's coastal transportation system that Lott and Cochran now want to set in motion. Under the plan, the CSX line -- which runs a few blocks off the coast line -- would be scrapped. CSX would move its freight traffic to existing tracks to the north owned by rival Norfolk Southern. Then U.S. 90, a wide federal highway that hugs Mississippi's beaches, would be rebuilt along the CSX rail bed. The route of the federal thoroughfare would be turned into a smaller, manicured "beach boulevard" through cities such as Biloxi, where visitors could "spend more time strolling among the casinos and taking in the views," as the Governor's Commission on Recovery, Rebuilding and Renewal put it.Allison has even more details from the Tri-State Economic and Transportation Benefits Study produced just before Hurricane Katrina devastated the coast line:
But the Tri-State Economic and Transportation Benefits Study calls for a project that's bigger than just moving CSX's seaside tracks north; it would create an additional north-south rail corridor, parallel CSX tracks that wouldn't be replaced, replace some line currently operated by the Canadian Northern Illinois Central railroad, and generally be much more ambitious in scale than the original effort to move some CSX tracks further north.The Study goes onto to detail the other beneficiaries of the railroad relocation/highway construction. Go to Under the Influence to check it out. Continue reading
Reoriented express in the press
An article in this morning's Washington Post, Jonathan Weissman writes of CSX rail relocation project:
The real impetus appears to be economic. For more than half a dozen years, Mississippi officials, development planners and tourism authorities have dreamed of the complex restructuring of Mississippi's coastal transportation system that Lott and Cochran now want to set in motion. Under the plan, the CSX line -- which runs a few blocks off the coast line -- would be scrapped. CSX would move its freight traffic to existing tracks to the north owned by rival Norfolk Southern. Continue reading
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