Earmarks might be better

Remember how happy some of us were feeling back in November when the Democrats took control of both Congress and my liver?

That was before the new majority (in a miscalculated act of political cowardice) failed even to prevent the war's growth. It was also before loyal NOE reader Will Evans blew holes in all that Congressional bloviating about earmark-free spending bills.

The Center for Investigative Reporting is reporting today that hundreds of members of Congress have been privately pressuring federal agencies to keep feeding pork to their home districts.

Check out CIR's growing catalogue of public records to find out how your representatives have attempted to pervert the spending process. And don't worry if you don't see their names. Only five of the 13 federal agencies who received Freedom of Information Act requests actually responded. So the fact that Eshoo, Feinstein and Boxer are not currently implicated doesn't mean much -- chances are the picture this story paints of Congress is altogether too rosy.