Nancy Of 100 Days

The much ballyhooed Pelosi "reforms" in the House were passed with great celebration in the first 100 hours of the new, super ethical Democratic majority takeover of the house. Pelosi nearly sprained herself patting herself on the back over the great changes and transparency she brought to the House.

The reforms lasted 100 days or so. Then the rules were simply ignored and the Democrats began behaving much, much worse than the Republicans had.

When Democrats took control of Congress four months back, incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., bragged it would take her party less than 100 hours to curb wasteful pork spending by requiring members to attach their names to their "earmarks," exposing such waste to the harsh light of public scrutiny.

She failed to mention this "reform" would remain in effect for little more than 100 days.

At this point, "Democrats are sidestepping rules approved their first day in power in January to clearly identify 'earmarks' — lawmakers' requests for specific projects and contracts for their states — in documents that accompany spending bills," The Associated Press reported Monday.

"Rather than including specific pet projects, grants and contracts in legislation as it is being written, Democrats are following an order by the House Appropriations Committee chairman to keep the bills free of such earmarks until it is too late for critics to effectively challenge them," The AP continued………

…….Meantime, Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., chuckled and accepted congratulatory handshakes on May 22 after his fellow Democrats banded together to permanently table (219-189) an official reprimand of the Pennsylvania Democrat for violating his party's own four-month-old rule barring "revenge killing" of other members' earmarks.

The whole point of the Democratic "reform" was to allow other members to criticize and oppose pork set-asides. But last month, when Rep. Murtha (the second-ranking Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, a man so powerful that he secured more than $200 million for his personal pet projects in 2006 alone, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense) sponsored an earmark to authorize $23 million for the National Drug Intelligence Center — a government agency that happens to be based in his district — Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., a former FBI agent, had the nerve to rise and propose the allocation be canceled.

And so it goes in the doublespeak world of the most ethical leadership the House has ever seen. The new boss is much worse than the old one. The polls are starting to collapse for the Democrats, incidentally. The rank and file will look back and revile the Reid-Pelosi regime in Congress.

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  By Purple Avenger, Tuesday, 5 June , 2007 @ 11:05 am

  The republicans were/are clearly incompetent, but the democrats are just plain suicidal.

Other Links to this Post

1. Sister Toldjah » Dem earmark reforms: 100 hours versus 100 days — Tuesday, 5 June , 2007 @ 11:14 am