Mac Thornberry and Pork

Recently Arizona Congressman Jeff Flake offered 19 amendments (all of which failed to garner majorities) to a variety of major spending bills that must be passed by Congress every year. These amendments were designed to eliminate what are called pork projects. In politics, a so-called "pork-barrel" project is government spending that benefits a small constituency of voters in a Congressman's district, but whose cost is picked up by all taxpayers. For instance, one Flake's amendments would have eliminated $500,000 for a swimming pool in Banning, CA, another would have eliminated $229,000 for dairy education in Iowa, and another would have cut $4,000,000 in funding for the Mystic Aquarium in New London, CT. It is hard to understand when the U.S. government is running large deficits and is run by Republicans, who laughably still claim they are the party of small government, why we as a country are spending millions of dollars on these kinds of projects.

Fortunately the Club For Growth, my favorite political organization, summarized the votes on all of the Flake amendments. Enter my Congressman, Republican Mac Thornberry, the representative of the 13th Congressional district of Texas who only voted for 6 of Flake's 19 amendments. Now it should be noted that I like Mac and have voted for him many times. He gets a lifetime 95 rating from the American Conservative Union and even voted against the ridiculous Transportation spending bill last year that funded the "Bridge to Nowhere."

However, like many of his colleagues (the Republican average was 5.5 anti-pork votes and the Democratic average was 0.55) Mac seems to have embraced the "I'll scratch your back, you scratch mine" philosophy of politics. Mac voted against the first five Flake amendments, which dealt with agriculture. That was not surprising since agriculture is very important to the 13th district, and Mac probably did not want any retaliation to the pork that I am sure he put into the agriculture bill.

I expected to see a higher rate of anti-pork votes from Mac. I guess I can take a small amount of comfort that he at least voted against 6 of these pork projects, but his votes for such things as "hydroponic tomato production in Ohio," a science museum in Virginia, and that swimming pool in California undercut his contention that he is a fiscal conservative. On the bright side, Mac voted for the last 5 anti-pork amendments that Flake offered. Maybe Mac has seen the light and will vote against pork-barrel projects every time from here on out. I am not holding my breath though.

Any comments or questions can be received at whyyouareaconservative@gmail.com

~ The Conservative Guy