Pork Barrel Politics Flashcards
What is pork barrel politics?
The undertaking of projects that benefit a group of citizens in return for their support or campaign donations
What is earmarking?
provisions within legislation that guarantee the support of a specific legislator in return for spending on specific projects or organisations that benefit their home district
What is the process of logrolling?
Members agree to support a bill with another’s earmark in exchange for the same treatment
What pork did minority leader Mitch McConnell secure in 2009?
$1.2 million to improve the shuttle bus service at Western Kentucky university
This was one of 60 earmarks in a bill that cost $113 million
What earmarks were put on the bill intended to help hurricane Sandy aftermath?
$150 million for fisheries in Alaska
$822 million for harbour dredging to help Mississippi River towns like St Louis
What pork was given to Alaska Senator Ted Stevens?
$223 million for the ‘bridge to nowhere’
A bridge to an island with a population of 50 people
What did Senator Tom Colburn (R) call earmarking?
A ‘gateway drug’ for spending
Why are people worried about pork?
Expensive
Legislators focus too much on the way a bill helps he ‘folks back home’ and take their eyes off the bigger picture of policy making and oversight.
What did the Legislative Transparency and Accountability Act (2006) do?
Tried to reduce the potential for corruption in the pork barrel process. All earmarks had to be listed along with the name or the member of congress who proposed it and a justification in terms of processZ
What happened in terms of pork barrel politics in the 2010 midterms?
They introduced a ban on all earmarks and this has been carried on
How has the ban on earmarks changed the way pork is passed out?
Pork barrel spending has been preserved by tucking provisions into emergency spending
(As seen in Sandy Aid Package)
Other methods, lettermarking or phonemaking have been used to get money but on a much smaller scale than before.
Why could the earmark ban be bad?
It could be contributing to congressional disfunction
Lawmakers are more aware of the needs of their communities than employees in federal departments so earmarks could be good.
Important legislation has only been possible through pork. E.g the 1964 civil rights act, LBJ needed to overcome the southern filibuster in the senate and the only way to do this was to win the Arizona democrat Carl Hayden, he did this by offering support for a Central Arizona Water project he had been campaigning for.
The earmark ban might be preventing the passage of much needed legislation to improve the USA’s infrastructure
Legislative paralysis could be caused by this ban
What pork has Lisa Murkowski (R) got? ( the Alaska senator write in- hence v popular)
She was a possible no on the tax bill so got pork for drilling in Alaska
How much pork was there is 2016?
$5.1 Bn
