4 ms·

We did: pork spending was mostly outlawed in 2011 (the F-35 dates from way before that). But as it turns out, the cure was almost as bad as the disease. Getting

We did: pork spending was mostly outlawed in 2011 (the F-35 dates from way before that). But as it turns out, the cure was almost as bad as the disease. Getting rid of pork has accelerated hyper-partisanship and dysfunctional gridlock, because without it there's no incentive to ever try to reach a deal with the other side instead of digging in on no-compromise radicalism to please your base.

throwanem 6y ago
> pork spending was mostly outlawed in 2011 Is there a longer discussion of this that you can link somewhere? I remember the phrase as a derogatory commonplace in adults' political discussion when I was a child, but the concept seems to have drifted out of the discourse since, and having now had my attention drawn to its absence I'd be interested to find out more about why.
- chrisco255 6y ago
  There's definitely still pork. I mean, look at how many pet projects were included in Covid relief funding. Pork is the idea of stuffing an unrelated project to benefit your local district or state (and thus, the politician's reelection chances) into a bigger bill that is unrelated to that expense. Like the most famous one was the Alaskan "bridge to nowhere" that would have cost $400 million: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravina_Island_Bridge https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravina_Island_Bridge
  - paulmd 6y ago
    That dates to 2005, so you are not really contradicting grandparent's point that this was mostly outlawed in 2011 (and that this has accelerated hyperpartisanship by removing an incentive for compromise).
    - chrisco255 6y ago
      Grandparent never pointed to what law they were talking about. They just made an offhanded, unverified remark. I also pointed out that a lot superfluous pork was included in Covid funding. "Pork" was never outlawed. It's not even a formally defined thing. If you think politicians can't figure out how to wiggle pet projects into huge multi trillion dollar spending bills then you really ought to tune into C-Span more often.
  - djur 6y ago
    What pet projects in Covid relief funding are you talking about?
    - chrisco255 6y ago
      https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/531294-congresss-pork-filled-covid-relief-bill https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/531294-congresss-pork-fi... This is the outdated proposal that didn't pass. But the current proposal is double this. I've tried to tune out politics for a while but you can be sure that pork is in a $1.9 trillion spending bill as sure as the sun rises.
      - djur 6y ago
        OK, thanks for making it clear that you don't know whether the bill contains pork or not.
adolph 6y ago
I believe you refer to a specific method of appropriations called "earmarks" which are often synonymous with pork barrel spending. https://www.politico.com/story/2011/02/senate-dems-give-in-on-earmark-ban-048623 https://www.politico.com/story/2011/02/senate-dems-give-in-o...
spiralx 6y ago
Plus one state's useful new spending is 49 states' pork, meaning that it's always easy to label anything as being evidence of government waste and corruption. But earmarks served as a useful way for states to get federal involvement in local issues that otherwise would never see the light of day, so their loss not only reduced the ability to get major things done, but also to get even tiny things done. Earmarks are supposedly coming back this year though.

throwanem 6y ago

> pork spending was mostly outlawed in 2011 Is there a longer discussion of this that you can link somewhere? I remember the phrase as a derogatory commonplace in adults' political discussion when I was a child, but the concept seems to have drifted out of the discourse since, and having now had my attention drawn to its absence I'd be interested to find out more about why.

chrisco255 6y ago
There's definitely still pork. I mean, look at how many pet projects were included in Covid relief funding. Pork is the idea of stuffing an unrelated project to benefit your local district or state (and thus, the politician's reelection chances) into a bigger bill that is unrelated to that expense. Like the most famous one was the Alaskan "bridge to nowhere" that would have cost $400 million: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravina_Island_Bridge https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravina_Island_Bridge
- paulmd 6y ago
  That dates to 2005, so you are not really contradicting grandparent's point that this was mostly outlawed in 2011 (and that this has accelerated hyperpartisanship by removing an incentive for compromise).
  - chrisco255 6y ago
    Grandparent never pointed to what law they were talking about. They just made an offhanded, unverified remark. I also pointed out that a lot superfluous pork was included in Covid funding. "Pork" was never outlawed. It's not even a formally defined thing. If you think politicians can't figure out how to wiggle pet projects into huge multi trillion dollar spending bills then you really ought to tune into C-Span more often.
- djur 6y ago
  What pet projects in Covid relief funding are you talking about?
  - chrisco255 6y ago
    https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/531294-congresss-pork-filled-covid-relief-bill https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/531294-congresss-pork-fi... This is the outdated proposal that didn't pass. But the current proposal is double this. I've tried to tune out politics for a while but you can be sure that pork is in a $1.9 trillion spending bill as sure as the sun rises.
    - djur 6y ago
      OK, thanks for making it clear that you don't know whether the bill contains pork or not.

adolph 6y ago

I believe you refer to a specific method of appropriations called "earmarks" which are often synonymous with pork barrel spending. https://www.politico.com/story/2011/02/senate-dems-give-in-on-earmark-ban-048623 https://www.politico.com/story/2011/02/senate-dems-give-in-o...

spiralx 6y ago

Plus one state's useful new spending is 49 states' pork, meaning that it's always easy to label anything as being evidence of government waste and corruption. But earmarks served as a useful way for states to get federal involvement in local issues that otherwise would never see the light of day, so their loss not only reduced the ability to get major things done, but also to get even tiny things done. Earmarks are supposedly coming back this year though.