Thursday, April 12, 2007

Menendez Blocks Earmark Reform

This happened back on March 26th, but I just saw the video yesterday (h/t Nightfly). When I first watched the video, due to the sound not being synced properly, I thought maybe somebody was doing a dub job. Senator Bob Menendez was attacked about corruption during the campaign, so I thought it might be something like "The Junior Senator from the most corrupt state in the nation blocks Congressional corruption reform, hardy har har."

Then I looked it up in the Congressional Record, and the text matches. This is no joke, and nobody should think it's a good thing or back Senator Menendez on this. I even went to Menendez's website to see if he explained the action, which he did not (his website is a lot better than Garrett's).

Read the bill yourself, it's short and straight forward. If you want an earmark, you have to put your name on it. Seems simple enough, and it's what voters wanted when they voted out the Republicans. Here's the video, and while you're waiting for Menendez at the end, ask yourself, why would he object to this?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You really should find out some answers before you conclude DeMint's version of a bill is gold and Menendez' bill isn't.

Do you understand anything about how the Senate operates, or the Rovean newspeak the Republicans use in their bill writing? Could you really think Menendez is trying not to get federal money for NJ children's health care?

I know nothing beyond what you posted, but the last thing I'd do is jump to the conclusion our senators should run to support DeMint's measure and not the Democrats' version.

Admin said...

This particular bill has nothing to do with Children's Health Funding. It's a straight up put your name on your earmark bill. For a Senate resolution it is extremely short (6 pages) and a relatively easy read (very unusual). The Republicans put the Democrats on notice that they were reintroducing it to the floor next week.

However, DeMint did come to the floor the day after to block Menendez's SCHIP bill. That was a children's health funding bill. IMHO that was political paypack.