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Mar 4 2009, 10:55 am by Chris Good

Bayh: Veto the Omnibus

Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN), who took a prominent role in campaigning for President Obama in his home state and was briefly rumored to be Obama's running mate before the Democratic convention, is urging Obama to veto Congress's $410 billion omnibus spending bill if it passes, though the White House has said Obama intends to sign it.) In an op-ed in today's Wall Street Journal, Bayh writes that the omibus is not the "change" Americans voted for: "Voters rightly demanded change in November's election, but this approach to spending represents business as usual in Washington, not the voters' mandate," Bayh writes. Bayh's comment seems more directed at Congress, but, it should be noted, John McCain made the same point in bashing Obama over the bill's earmarks in a floor speech Monday: "So much for the promise of change," McCain said.

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OGLiberal

Haven't I read in multiple sources that earmarks - and earmarks aren't always bad - account for just 1%, maybe 2%, of the total spending bill? And that at least 40% of those earmarks were requested by GOP lawmakers. Obama is going to veto a $410B spending package, one that is needed to get us through to the end of the fiscal year, because 2% of the money - at most - is allocated to bi-partisan earmarks, some of which may be very worthwhile?

The earmark process will improve simply by virtue of the transparency that is being encouraged and put in place by the Obama administration. But you can't change Congress overnight. You can't change them in 2 months. It may take a year or more. But vetoing the bill would be foolish.

hotyogidc (Replying to: OGLiberal)

I too, heard it repeated from "several sources, that the (9000+) earmarks in the omnibus make up less than 1% - 2% of the total". However, all of the sources were either quoting, or referencing, a comment made by President Obama. One catch, Obama didn't use the word "earmark". Instead, he referred to the earmarks as the "target of complaints", because not two days prior, he had proudly boasted, "this piece of legislation contains NO EARMARKS, a first for Washington". So really, there is no "change"; we're still stuck with the same semantic games dems love to play...like debating "on what the meaning of the word 'is' 'is'", and a president who lies to disguise his true agenda.

Furthermore, relying on the false "hope" of a transparent administration to promote any kind of "change" is just foolish at this point, given the numerous instances proving transparency to be yet another broken, campaign promise (E.G. secret letter to Medvedev {aka. Putin} humiliating exposed, no lobbyists in cabinet, secret "talking point meetings" between Rahm Emanuel and network news media {Politico 03/04/09}, etc...)