Sen. Kyl Grabs $200 Milliion in Pork After No Earmarks Pledge

[Procrustes Stretched]

I would recommend that the lefties might want to get the actual facts of this 'pork' before they get their asses handed to them.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

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Cali-Boil is going to hand your ass back to you...

I would recommend that the lefties might want to get the actual facts of this 'pork' before they get their asses handed to them.

...or so she says.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

I would recommend that the lefties might want to get the actual facts of this 'pork' before they get their asses handed to them.

very true, Cali Girl

Let's just watch and see if they realize.




* I'm also highly entertained that the OP links to a blog.

By ANDREW TAYLOR
The Associated Press
updated 11/23/2010 6:29:15 PM ET 2010-11-23T23:29:15

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans' ban on earmarks — money included in a bill by a lawmaker to benefit a home-state project or interest — was short-lived.

 

[goldcatt]

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans' ban on earmarks — money included in a bill by a lawmaker to benefit a home-state project or interest — was short-lived.


Only three days after GOP senators and senators-elect renounced earmarks, Arizona Sen. Jon Kyl, the No. 2 Senate Republican, got himself a whopping $200 million to settle an Arizona Indian tribe's water rights claim against the government.


Kyl slipped the measure into a larger bill sought by President Barack Obama and passed by the Senate on Friday to settle claims by black farmers and American Indians against the federal government. Kyl's office insists the measure is not an earmark, and the House didn't deem it one when it considered a version earlier this year.

Republicans' ban on earmarks was short-lived - Politics - Capitol Hill - msnbc.com

Whoa there. So this is money for a voluntary settlement or to satisfy a final judgment? Who authorized the settlement and amount, and in what case(s)? Authority to settle a lawsuit or choose not to appeal a judgment lies with the Executive, which is why the bills to pay them out are also almost always authored by the Executive.

If we're going after the facts, we need ALL the facts.

 

[California Girl]

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans' ban on earmarks — money included in a bill by a lawmaker to benefit a home-state project or interest — was short-lived.


Only three days after GOP senators and senators-elect renounced earmarks, Arizona Sen. Jon Kyl, the No. 2 Senate Republican, got himself a whopping $200 million to settle an Arizona Indian tribe's water rights claim against the government.


Kyl slipped the measure into a larger bill sought by President Barack Obama and passed by the Senate on Friday to settle claims by black farmers and American Indians against the federal government. Kyl's office insists the measure is not an earmark, and the House didn't deem it one when it considered a version earlier this year.

Republicans' ban on earmarks was short-lived - Politics - Capitol Hill - msnbc.com

Whoa there. So this is money for a voluntary settlement or to satisfy a final judgment? Who authorized the settlement and amount, and in what case(s)? Authority to settle a lawsuit or choose not to appeal a judgment lies with the Executive, which is why the bills to pay them out are also almost always authored by the Executive.

If we're going after the facts, we need ALL the facts.

What? Get all the facts before wading in with opinions? How very intelligent! Nah! We can't have people doin' that. Whatever would the HuffPuff bitch about?

 

[goldcatt]

From the MSNBC link Missourian posted:

"You have to do these water settlements or allow the courts to simply award damages," said Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., perhaps the most anti-earmark member of Congress. "An earmark is something when an individual gets a goodie for their district outside of the regular legislative process."

I'm confused here. Is this a settlement formalized in the Courts and authorized by the Executive, or is Congress trying to usurp a power it granted to the Executive and "settle" the pending cases informally on their own? I'd love to see some case names to pull up court docs. It sounds like it could go either way, there's a lot of facts missing.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Sen. Kyl Grabs $200 Million in Pork After No Earmarks Pledge | ChattahBox News Blog

(ChattahBox Political News)—Republican lawmakers, anxious to appease tea party members and follow through with their campaign rhetoric to end earmarks, are now engaged in comical linguistic exercises to exempt their pork, as not earmarks under the official definition. The Associated Press reports that Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) did just that, by quietly adding $200 million in pork for his state to a recent bill funding the Pigford settlement for discrimination claims made by minority and Native Americans farmers against the federal government. But he had denounced earmarks, as wasteful spending just days earlier. And on his official website, Kyl asks, “But, if legislators can’t muster the will to eliminate a small portion of spending, how will they be able to make the bigger, more difficult decisions?” Apparently, earmarks and pork are only wasteful when Democrats do it. And when Republicans add earmarks to bills, their pork somehow rises to the level of vitally important infrastructure projects, which magically don’t fall under the official earmark definition. What an ingenious scam.
Earmark hypocrisy is nothing new for Kyl. Last year he raised holy hell about Democratic earmarks in the Stimulus bill, but the year before, he had requested that $118 million in pork be carved out from from the federal budget to be used for special projects for his state. <more>

This brings to mind the Michelle Bachmann story the other day where her response to the banning of earmarks is that she wants to rename them:

Michele Bachmann likes earmarks. Just call them something else - Minneapolis / St. Paul News - The Blotter

 

[NYcarbineer]

I really hope no one around here anyway is naive enough to believe that the 2010 GOP election success was going to be somehow transformative.

 

[Missourian]

From the MSNBC link Missourian posted:

"You have to do these water settlements or allow the courts to simply award damages," said Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., perhaps the most anti-earmark member of Congress. "An earmark is something when an individual gets a goodie for their district outside of the regular legislative process."

I'm confused here. Is this a settlement formalized in the Courts and authorized by the Executive, or is Congress trying to usurp a power it granted to the Executive and "settle" the pending cases informally on their own? I'd love to see some case names to pull up court docs. It sounds like it could go either way, there's a lot of facts missing.

All good questions...and I don't have any more answers than what is in the article.

But, for the purpose of this thread, those questions are irrelevant.

The attachment was 100% inline with the Senate Bill that was voted on.

Not an earmark, and nobody but the loony left is attempting to label it as such.

 

[goldcatt]

From the MSNBC link Missourian posted:

"You have to do these water settlements or allow the courts to simply award damages," said Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., perhaps the most anti-earmark member of Congress. "An earmark is something when an individual gets a goodie for their district outside of the regular legislative process."

I'm confused here. Is this a settlement formalized in the Courts and authorized by the Executive, or is Congress trying to usurp a power it granted to the Executive and "settle" the pending cases informally on their own? I'd love to see some case names to pull up court docs. It sounds like it could go either way, there's a lot of facts missing.

All good questions...and I don't have any more answers than what is in the article.

But, for the purpose of this thread, those questions are irrelevant.

The attachment was 100% inline with the Senate Bill that was voted on.

Not an earmark, and nobody but the loony left is attempting to label it as such.

That's not actually true. I'm looking for the wording, but from your article it sounds like it may be designated to fund certain projects, which means it is not a court settlement. If it's not a court settlement, we have either a separation of powers issue or an issue of hypocrisy - or maybe (likely) both.

Or the article could be worded vaguely, the Congressmen quoted either not understanding what they're saying or their quotes truncated, and it could be what you say. /shrug

I'm not closing my mind on this in either direction yet. I wish the media were more thorough...yeah, I know. Wish in one hand, spit in the other.

 

[Queen]

The $200 million in Kyl's measure would be used to construct and maintain a drinking water project on the Fort Apache Indian Reservation, including a dam, reservoir, treatment plant and delivery pipelines.

The water system is settlement compensation for numerous abuses by the federal government, which included clearing trees and other vegetation from thousands of acres of tribal lands in order to increase runoff into the Salt River, a source of water for the cities of Phoenix, Scottsdale, Tempe, Mesa and other communities. The tribe also would waive a half-dozen other claims against the government.

A top Democrat scornfully pointed out that the project is going to a state whose GOP lawmakers claim to oppose earmarks.

"I do know an earmark when I see it. And this, my friends, is an earmark," Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said in a prepared floor statement. He said Kyl's project would help the White Mountain Apaches "make snow at their ski resort, improve water flow to their casino and build fish hatcheries to improve local fish production."

Republicans' ban on earmarks was short-lived - Politics - Capitol Hill - msnbc.com

Looks like an earmark, walks like an earmark. I think it's an earmark.

 

[Queen]

Imagine that. The lefties are falling all over themselves to fuck American Indians out of some money.

And that's a big fat lie, not surprisingly. No one's saying anything about fucking Native Americans out of some money. I didn't see anyone give an opinion about this $200 million water project at all. Only about the hypocrisy and dishonesty of Kyle grabbing the $200 million in earmarks for his state after proclaiming he was not going to take any earmarks.

 

[ABikerSailor]

Hypocrite, thy name is Tea Party.