Congratulations are in order for the Republican leadership in the House for forcing the Democrats to stop their hiding of earmarks. Funny that they even had to force this issue since Nancy said she was going to drain the swamp: (h/t Captains Quarters)
I’m writing to update you on the status of our united Republican effort to compel the Democratic majority to abandon its plan for slush funds for secret earmarks.
A tentative agreement has been reached between Republican and Democratic leaders – an agreement that represents a victory for House Republicans. The terms of the agreement are as follows:
* Democrats will abandon their plans to pass appropriations bills with slush funds for secret earmarks. The plan announced last month by Chairman Obey to keep all earmarks secret until “air-dropping” them into conference reports will be dropped, effective immediately. Two appropriations bills (Homeland Security, Military Quality) that include little or no earmarks will move forward. Following consideration of these two bills, all 10 remaining appropriations bills will come to the floor with their earmarks fully disclosed and subject to challenge by any Member. In the unique case of the Energy & Water bill, the earmarks will move to the floor in a package separate from the non-earmark portion of the bill, but (again) the earmarks will be fully disclosed and subject to challenge by any Member. In short: the Democrats’ slush funds for secret earmarks are dead.
* Democrats will restore the 2006 House Republican earmark reforms for appropriations bills. This rules change will go into effect immediately after the House completes action on the Homeland Security and Military Quality appropriations bills, which include little or no earmarks. This aspect of the agreement will restore a key element of the 2006 GOP reforms repealed by the Democratic leadership in 2007.
The agreement does NOT include specific time limits on debate for any appropriations bills. Democrats earlier today demanded that Republicans accept unprecedented time limits that would arbitrarily minimize debate on spending bills involving hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer funds. House Republican leaders refused this demand. Instead, we indicated to Democratic leaders that if the earmark reforms outlined above are complied with both letter and spirit, and adequate time is provided to debate substantive issues, Republicans do not anticipate that we will need to engage in extraordinary parliamentary tactics that will again bring the appropriations process to a halt.
We’ll let you know more as we know it. In the meantime, please know how proud I am of our House Republican team. We’ve taken a principled stand together on behalf of the American people. And if we continue to stand together, we will succeed in bringing meaningful change to the way in which Washington spends the taxpayers’ money. Thank you for the role you’ve played in making this victory happen.
Great news and something to really congratulate the Republicans on. Gateway Pundit found a great video of the happenings inside our congress:
Pentagon officials are bracing for a fight with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) over her desire to allow lawmakers’ adult children to tag along on taxpayer-funded travel for free.
Pelosi wants them to be able to fill the role of lawmakers’ spouses when the latter are unable to make a trip because of health issues or work commitments.
“It has been longstanding policy that, in the absence of a congressional spouse, the adult child of a member of Congress may accompany the member on official U.S. government travel abroad for protocol reasons and without reimbursing the U.S. Treasury,” Pelosi spokesman Nadeam Elshami said. “Speaker Pelosi believes that a modern policy must reflect the professional responsibilities or health realities that might prevent a spouse from participating, and instead permit an adult child to fulfill the protocol needs of the official trip.”
Pentagon officials say the policy is that the Treasury must be reimbursed at commercial rates for children who accompany members on such trips, often called codels.
Pelosi’s office inquired about such travel on June 1, according to a Department of Defense memo obtained by The Hill.
In a June 8 memo, the head of legislative affairs for the Pentagon, Robert L. Wilkie, told Defense Secretary Robert Gates that he sees Pelosi’s question as a first step toward challenging the policy.“We were told that the Speaker would expect that members’ children (of married and unmarried [members of Congress]) would not have to reimburse the Treasury,” Wilkie wrote. “We expect future challenges from the House leadership on this policy.”
Pentagon aides did not respond to requests for comment.
But taxpayer watchdog groups and ethics advocates said they were surprised Pelosi would seek more perks for members.
“One of the things she was praised for when she came in was her sweeping reforms on gifts and travel,” said Craig Holman of Public Citizen. “It is very disheartening if she is, in fact, backsliding on this.”
Backsliding? Hell, she has been at the forefront of this kind of corruption for years.
This is the NEW Congress folks
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