I agree with Andrew: This sudden race in the House to see whose holier-than-thou on earmarks is a good thing.  But there are three reasons why no one should get too excited about the recent developments:

1.  As Andrew notes and I've remarked on previously, eliminating earmarks doesn't actually reduce spending; all it does is change who makes the decision from Congress to an executive branch agency.  Unless the appropriation is reduced at the same time the earmark is eliminated, which no one is suggesting, the amount that will be spent will remain the same.

I am all for eliminating earmarks to for-profit companies and for extending it to non-profits as well.  All discretionary money should be awarded on an open, competitive basis, with oversight of the executive branch agencies by appropriate Congressional committees.  Earmarks have no place in federal spending, as a matter of principle.  From The Washington Post:

"It ensures that for-profit companies no longer reap the rewards of congressional earmarks and limits the influence of lobbyists on members of Congress," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said, linking the move to earlier decisions to ban gifts from lobbyists and forbid privately financed travel.

Democrats made the move to bar earmarks for for-profit entities despite fierce resistance from many rank-and-file lawmakers who rely on them to spread federal money around their districts and consider them crucial to their political fortunes.

Republicans responded immediately by proposing a moratorium on all earmarks, even those for nonprofits such as universities. House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) said voters would reward Republicans in the November midterm elections for taking on special interests.

It's not the $20 billion hit to the budget -- federal spending may not even go down if special interest projects are replaced by meritorious projects.  It is the lack of transparency and the potential for corruption that is the problem.  I don't think this ban alone will be enough to stop the corruption -- Congress must do its job to oversee the federal agencies running the competitive processes. 

I need to rant on this one.

I was going to use a "This Is Just Silly" headline, but it's not silly: If it's true, it's infuriating and pathetic, and that's being kind.

Republican and self-professed fiscal conservative Senator Richard Shelby (AL) yesterday supposedly put a hold on all Obama administration nominations unless he gets billions of dollars for several earmarks for his state.

This is a senior senator from a political party that routinely rails against earmarks, government spending and deficits in effect saying...the deficit be damned, I demand that additional billions of dollars be spent for projects.

That puts the whole GOP bull on the budget and deficit out there for all to see.

A number of people are calling for Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid (NV) to tell Shelby to go to hell by not honoring the holds, bringing up the nominations, and forcing Shelby to filibuster each one over the spending/earmark issue.

The Senate yesterday followed its vote to stop funding for additional F-22s with a vote to stop funding for an alternate engine for the F-35.  This was yet another administration proposal put forth by the White House and Defense Secretary Gates and another budget-related win for the administration.

Why was it a win?

1.  Like the F-22, it was an earmark that the White House proposed to eliminate.

2.  This is something the Bush administration repeatedly proposed but could never get done even when both houses of Congress were controlled by the GOP.

3.  It saves money.

As with the F-22, there's a long way to go before anyone can be sure that the alternate engine for the F-35 isn't funded.  But this first not-so-small step is something that should definitely be noted for the record.

Yesterday's announcement by House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Jack Murtha (D-PA) that, in light of the Senate's vote against it, he was not going to include funds for the F-22 in the fiscal 2010 DOD appropriation, may have been the final blow for the plane and a huge budget-related win for the White House.

We'll see.  Murtha is obviously extremely important, but there are still a number of ways that funds for additional buys for the fighter could be added at other points in the  process.  Note that Murtha didn't say he now opposes the F-22, only that he wouldn't add funds to buy any more in his bill.  But if someone offered an amendment on the House floor to restore funding, or the Senate approprations committee included funds it its version of the 2010 DOD appropriation, or if the funds magically appeared at the last minute in the conference report on the spending bill...

Yesterday's 58-40 vote in the Senate to cut funds for the F-22 is a big deal.

But this was a vote on an authorization bill and the funds can still be provided in the DOD appropriation that will be considered later in the year.

An appropriation enacted after an authorization is the most recent indication of congressional intent and, therefore, legally may provide funds for programs that have not been authorized. That makes this vote important (especially because it shows what the White House can do on Capital Hill), but not the end of the story

It is not inconceivable that someone who voted against F-22 in the authorization eventually will vote for it in the appropriation.

So those who think it's time to celebrate should hold the champagne.

Here's my column from today's Roll Call.

2009 Brings Yet Another Ridiculous Debate Over Earmarks

Is anyone else as bored and frustrated with the ongoing earmark debate as I am? You should be.

Andrew...welcome back.  You were missed.

You ask: "The question is whether further progress against that tendency could be made if the cover of earmarks were taken away.  What do you say, Stan?"

Actually, I'm convinced that the opposite would happen.  No earmarks in a spending bill would mean the fight for money for a district or state would be waged at the agency or department that gets the funds rather than on the Hill.

In other words, your question only considers half of the equation.  Yes, there would be no winners when the bill was considered on the floor of the House or Senate.  But there would also be no losers.  That means that more people would likely have an incentive to vote for a spending bill because there would still be a possibility that the funds their constituents wanted could be obtained later in the process.

Because everything was still possible when the bill was debated and voted on, a member of Congress would be able to tell their voters that he or she was still fighting to get the funds for the project they wanted.  In fact, the only way to be sure the project wasn't funded would be by voting against the bill.

Back from spring break, I'm curious about Stan's latest post about earmarks, and in particular, two passages from a column last year:

Another of my budget friends insists that eliminating earmarks will eventually lead to lower spending because if Representatives and Senators can’t provide funds for their districts and states, there will be fewer items in these bills for their constituents and that will make them less likely to be supported. I’m skeptical about that argument: Even if there isn’t an earmark, there is still something in most appropriations for almost everyone.

This passage acknowledges the possibility of earmarks providing incentives to expand total appropriations and downplays it.  The problem, according to Stan, is that "there is still something in most appropriations for almost everyone."  The question is whether further progress against that tendency could be made if the cover of earmarks were taken away.  What do you say, Stan?

Another passage that is troubling is the following:

Lost in all of the debate (and the reporting about the debate) on the earmarks in the omnibus 2009 appropriations bill the Senate is still working to adopt is the basic fact that cutting earmarks doesn't save any money.

This is not open for discussion.  An earmark simply is a congressional decision to allocate part of appropriation for a particular purpose.  Eliminating the allocation doesn't reduce the appropriation, it simply leaves the allocation decision to a federal department or agency rather than to Congress.

No problem if you want to argue that these earmarks should not be funded at all because the projects aren't worthwhile or don't have a federal purpose.  But keep in mind that projects approved by a department or agency are just as likely to be infuriating as projects included at the behest of of a member of Congress.

Just don't tell me or anyone else that you want to eliminate the earmarks to cut spending.  That's not just disingenuous; it's a lie.

Here's what I said about earmarks last February in Roll Call.