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Rant: Obama names porkmeister to head Department of Transportation
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Despite promises to reduce rampant earmarks, the president-elect has selected a porkmeister as the next 
Secretary of Transportation. Representative Ray LaHood is Mr. Obama’a choice for heading up the Department of Transportation, an agency with high pork potential.
As noted by the Wall Street Journal, LaHood has little experience in transportation, having served briefly on the House Transportation Committee. Mr. Clinton’s two Transportation Secretaries had transportation experience on a congressional or state highway level, and the current Sectretary of Transportation, Mary Peters, was Arizona's Director of Transportation Policy.
But the Journal cites Mr. LaHood’s experience as primarily on the House Appropriations Committee, notes the he told a reporter of the Peoria Journal Star,
“The reason I went on the Appropriations Committee, the reason other people go on the Appropriations Committee, is they know that it puts them in a position to know where the money is at, to know the people who are doling the money out and to be in the room when the money is being doled out."
LaHood, a Republican from Peoria, resisted Republican efforts to reign in earmarks, citing that it was better for individual politicians to spend the money rather than some bureaucrats in Washington. That’s despite the “bureaucrats” are charged with spending money under guidelines designed by Congress and spent in cooperation with state legislatures and transportation departments who might have some idea of the states’ needs.
Having brought $62.7 million in earmarks for his district, either by directly or by log rolling with other lawmakers, LaHood is a master at delivering pork, with a top ten percent ranking in the House. With $850 billion about to be divvied up in “stimulus” it appears that Mr. LaHood has found himself “in the room when the money is being doled out.”
The president-to-be when stumping for votes told the country that he would eliminate earmarks. If that’s the case, Mr. LaHood seems a peculiar choice if eliminate pork from the D.C. diet is a campaign promise he truly intends to keep.
Read the Wall Street Journal report..
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