Obama remarks on Earmarks

President Obama addresses the earmark concerns in the bill just signed. Below is an excerpt from his statements.

Now, yesterday Congress sent me the final part of last year's budget; a piece of legislation that rolls nine bills required to keep the government running into one, a piece of legislation that addresses the immediate concerns of the American people by making needed investments in line with our urgent national priorities.

That's what nearly 99 percent of this legislation does -- the nearly 99 percent that you probably haven't heard much about.

What you likely have heard about is that this bill does include earmarks. Now, let me be clear: Done right, earmarks have given legislators the opportunity to direct federal money to worthy projects that benefit people in their districts, and that's why I've opposed their outright elimination. And I also find it ironic that some of those who rail most loudly against this bill because of earmarks actually inserted earmarks of their own –- and will tout them in their own states and their own districts.

But the fact is that on occasion, earmarks have been used as a vehicle for waste, and fraud, and abuse. Projects have been inserted at the 11th hour, without review, and sometimes without merit, in order to satisfy the political or personal agendas of a given legislator, rather than the public interest. There are times where earmarks may be good on their own, but in the context of a tight budget might not be our highest priority. So these practices hit their peak in the middle of this decade, when the number of earmarks had ballooned to more than 16,000, and played a part in a series of corruption cases.

Wow earmarks ballooned to more than 16,000!!! Hello, this bill has nearly 8,000 earmarks. That is half of what you call ballooning.

In 2007, the new Democratic leadership in Congress began to address these abuses with a series of reforms that I was proud to have helped to write. We eliminated anonymous earmarks and created new measures of transparency in the process, so Americans can better follow how their tax dollars are being spent. These measures were combined with the most sweeping ethics reforms since Watergate. We banned gifts and meals and made sure that lobbyists have to disclose who they're raising campaign money from, and who in Congress they send it to. So we've made progress. But let's face it, we have to do more.

It doesn't appear that those reforms are working very well.

I am signing an imperfect omnibus bill because it's necessary for the ongoing functions of government, and we have a lot more work to do. We can't have Congress bogged down at this critical juncture in our economic recovery. But I also view this as a departure point for more far-reaching change.

Blah blah blah. If you are serious about reform then get serious. This is a bunch of BS. This is like telling the kid it isn't ok to eat the cookie before dinner and next time they can't have a cookie but go ahead this time.

In my discussions with Congress, we have talked about the need for further reforms to ensure that the budget process inspires trust and confidence instead of cynicism. So I believe as we move forward, we can come together around principles that prevent the abuse of earmarks.

These principles begin with a simple concept: Earmarks must have a legitimate and worthy public purpose. Earmarks that members do seek must be aired on those members' websites in advance, so the public and the press can examine them and judge their merits for themselves. Each earmark must be open to scrutiny at public hearings, where members will have to justify their expense to the taxpayer.

How is that going to work? Who decides? Everyone thinks there earmark is important. Do we all remember in the Stimulus there was money for a train from Vegas to Disney? How does that have the public in mind? That was a pet project.

Next, any earmark for a for-profit private company should be subject to the same competitive bidding requirements as other federal contracts. The awarding of earmarks to private companies is the single most corrupting element of this practice, as witnessed by some of the indictments and convictions that we've already seen. Private companies differ from the public entities that Americans rely on every day –- schools, and police stations, and fire departments.

When somebody is allocating money to those public entities, there's some confidence that there's going to be a public purpose. When they are given to private entities, you've got potential problems. You know, when you give it to public companies -- public entities like fire departments, and if they are seeking taxpayer dollars, then I think all of us can feel some comfort that the state or municipality that's benefitting is doing so because it's going to trickle down and help the people in that community. When they're private entities, then I believe they have to be evaluated with a higher level of scrutiny.

Furthermore, it should go without saying that an earmark must never be traded for political favors.

And finally, if my administration evaluates an earmark and determines that it has no legitimate public purpose, then we will seek to eliminate it, and we'll work with Congress to do so. - CBS News