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The earmarks race

Posted at 10:57 AM on September 10, 2008 by Bob Collins (11 Comments)

Who gets more earmarks -- Alaska or Minnesota?

Minnesota, and it's not close, according to a database of 2008 earmarks from the Office of Management and Budget. In fact, Minnesota this year is second only to California in earmark money.

Alaska has been in the earmark news because of Sarah Palin's insistence that she was against the Bridge to Nowhere after she was for it.

Alaska has 119 earmarks so far in 2008, more than Minnesota's 96. But Minnesota's total pork -- if you buy the notion that earmarks are pork -- is $362 million, compared with Alaska's $155 million.

$195 million of that was the new I-35W bridge. Another $7 million or so was various highway projects.

$1.8 million was directed to the Army Corps of Engineers in Stillwater. One of the sponsors of that project? Rep. Michele Bachmann. "I have taken a bipartisan pledge to not seek any earmarks this year and am working with like-minded Republicans and Democrats to reform this system which has become little more than a political favor factory at taxpayer expense," Rep. Bachmann says on her Web site.

As for Palin, she sent her U.S. senator -- the under-indictment Ted Stevens -- almost $200 million worth of earmark requests, according to the Seattle Times.

But unlike Minnesota, the biggest share of Alaska's "pork" is in health and human services programs, including patient care services and mental health programs.

There is the occasional questionable program for which Alaska received money -- the robotic astrobiology program, for example -- but it was sponsored by a California politician.

Another sends $2 million for improvements to the Akutan Airport.

This is the Akutan Airport, according to a search of Picasa photo collections:

Although Sen. John McCain says -- correctly -- that he's never accepted an earmark, Arizona still gets money via earmarks -- $65 million so far this year for such projects as diabetes research, "web-based exhibits" for a museum, and the Tucson basin drainage project. All come by way of Arizona's other senator -- John Kyl (a Republican) -- and the state's evenly-split congressional delegation.

Still, the fact that Gov. Tim Pawlenty's state is the second-biggest recipient of earmarks could -- one imagines -- have made for Palin-like scrutiny had McCain chosen Pawlenty as his running mate. "When he stood up to special interests, and fought against earmarks and pork-barrel spending in Congress, John McCain put our country first!" Pawlenty declared when he spoke to the Republican National Convention last week, raising the possibility that those officials who accepted the money didn't.

Comments (11)

An interesting and perhaps important question to ask is can earmarks catagorically be defined as bad?
The was the terms "earmarks" and "pork" are thrown around during elections, it would seem so, but is that a fair assessment?
Should there be more of an effort to let the public know what the content of earmarks are, rather than simply the amount that is spent? This is a particularly intriguing issue in light of the fact that the federal funding for the 35W bridge is technically an earmark. Yet, would most of the general public claim that pushing to fund the rebuilding of the 35W bridge is wasteful and reflects poorly on one's ability to effectively govern?

Posted by Jennifer B | September 10, 2008 11:24 AM

If a politician WERE to acknowledge that an earmark can be non-wasteful spending -- and there's certain a valid claim in the case of the I-35W bridge (if you accept that a bidding process in which it's not made clear the low bidder won't necessarily win and which is a phenomenally expensive project isn't wasteful in itself) -- that the strategy of being against earmarks just because they're earmarks goes out the window.

Posted by Bob Collins | September 10, 2008 11:47 AM

Using your numbers, Alaska's earmarks total $226,000/per inhabitant.

Minnesota's earmarks total $69,615/per inhabitant.

Per capita, Bob. Per capita.

Posted by CaliGuy | September 10, 2008 12:21 PM

I think per capita is a pretty lame way to measure things here, although I understand the reason people are doing it in the Palin case. Especially where infrastructure is concerned.

I think there's an argument to be made that because of its remote nature, that a transportation infrastructure is more critical to Alaska than, say, the widening of a highway in Minnesota.

Posted by Bob Collins | September 10, 2008 12:25 PM

I think per capita is a pretty lame way to measure things here...

Per capita is precisely the way infrastructure issues should be examined, i.e., a "per user" value.

The fact that Alaska's earmarks were almost three times the amount of Minnesota's should be alarming to all citizens. And it should be a sign that something is amiss.

Posted by CaliGuy | September 10, 2008 12:40 PM

So, I would think that it's safe to assume that regardless of the way the numbers breakdown, earmarks are never going to be presented to the voting public with the possibility of being anything but wasteful. This could be largely because voters don't necessarily look into or retain all of the information regarding the candidates, but take away the most prominent and easy to digest pieces.
In light of that, it would seem to be political suicide to try to make a defense to the general public for some earmarks, when it is much easier to attach all of the negative connotations to a political buzzword, point to the most blatent examples of waste, and rile people up against it.

Posted by Jennifer B | September 10, 2008 12:43 PM

"I think there's an argument to be made that because of its remote nature, that a transportation infrastructure is more critical to Alaska than, say, the widening of a highway in Minnesota."

Is not the inverse also true? That being: because of the remote nature of Alaska, they have fewer road miles to maintain? They don't build roads to every lake up there, they fly to most of them. Floatplanes don't need a whole lot of infrastructure, last time I checked.

Posted by bsimon | September 10, 2008 12:44 PM

Earmarks seem to be a catch-22:

Get earmarks for your state and you are contributing to the "rampent pork-barrel spending" of Washington.

Don't get earmarks for your state and you aren't doing enough for your state in congress.

Posted by brian | September 10, 2008 1:05 PM

John Kline swore off earmarks this year and we still got a lot for Minnesota. Just think what we would have gotten if he had taken his share.

Why is per capita important? When we pay our taxes all states don't pay the same amount, in fact, high salary states like Minnesota (Bob you should probably check my statement on this with the government because my research is old.) pay even more because we get pushed into higher brackets than lower salary states.

If I remember there was a report a couple of months ago that stated Minnesota got only about 67% of the dollars back that we paid originally where some states get more than 100%.

Caliguy, I am not sure what our state population is but if it is 4 mil thats just over $90 per inhabitant for the last year.

Posted by bigalmn | September 10, 2008 1:48 PM

http://www.andrys.com/palin-kilkenny.html

Posted by c | September 10, 2008 1:57 PM

I would think that a state that hands out oil royalties to its, uh, taxpayers and runs its government on low taxes should not be also feeding at the federal trough for public works. I have not heard a rationale for why Alaskans support so much of their state from federal sources.

Posted by Ted S. | September 11, 2008 3:45 PM

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