Capitol Hill is rife with talk this afternoon about a draft Continuing Resolution to keep the federal government funded through the balance of the current fiscal year. Soon after winning the November 06 elections and regaining majorities in the Senate and House, Democratic congressional leaders promised to pass a CR for the rest of the year without earmarks. The departing GOP majority had approved an earmark-less CR but it ends in February, thus leaving the Democrats holding the fiscal bag. Why the fervent talk on the Hill? Because the Democratic CR text includes lots of earmarks and the only version that seems to be available is in an unsearchable PDF format that makes it quite difficult to read and, of course, it’s not available on the Internet. Being 130 pages in length adds to the difficulty of actually figuring out what’s in it, as do the numerous hand-written notes scattered throughout the document. Unfortunately, voting on a document that nobody outside of the few congressional insiders can search or read is par for the course for Congress under both parties. What happened to that promise to run the most honest and open Congress ever? UPDATE: Earmarks for Rain forests in Iowa are Back People on the Hill are culling through the CR and what they are finding is eerily like what people found in recent years when the Republicans were running wild with earmarks. Andrew Moylan at the National Taxypayers Union reports that the CR contains a provision requiring executive branch agencies to submit a plan to the House Appropriations Committee within 30 days. The committee and agency staff will then discuss how the tax dollars contained in the CR will be spent. As Andrew observes: “Though it’s not obvious at first glance, what this means is that agency staffers and Appropriations staffers will be consulting on how to disburse funds. I can hear it now…’If you want your personnel budget increase of 3%, then you’ll be sure to see that $50 million is directed to my town for a bridge project.'” You can read all of Andrew’s post on the CR here. And at Americans for Prosperity, Ed Frank says the CR contains more than $44 million for that tropical rain forest in Iowa without which America simply cannot win the War on Terrorism. Go here for the full report from Ed. UPDATE II: University, Ag Earmarks Still in CR The CR is looking more and more like an onion, as the more layers are peeled back, the more likely it is to bring tears to the eyes of those who hoped for genuine reform. Now The Chronicle of Higher Education reports the CR preserves most of the $185 million in funding for agricultural research at state universities, as well as increases in funding for projects selected by the National Institutes of Health. NIH is expected to fund 10,000 or more such projects, reversing a decline seen in recent years. You can read the full Chronicle report here.
