A Renewed Contract

Fire of Liberty

It looks like Newt Gingrich is back into his "Contract With America" mode by noting in this most recent Op/Ed that the US Congress needs to get a better grip on the wasteful spending and the enormous pork barrel spending that has emerged post Katrina. It's all well and good to offer a helping hand to the folks in New Orleans but it's far different when the politicians of Louisiana and their friends get in on the ground-level of the appropriations of such funds, you eventually discover that the politicians have used the emotions of the horrific tragedy to get money for projects that sound great but in the long run it's a boondoggle that achieves nothing. I'd say that Congress and its counterparts in Louisiana are committing one of the greatest tragedies to the region especially when you look at what they're spending money on:

In addition, one's compassion and generosity is tested when one realizes that the Louisiana lawmakers have stuffed the 440-page bill with numerous items that have nothing to do with hurricane relief. This pork barrel spending includes: $120 million for a laboratory facilities and equipment at the Southern Regional Research Center, $35 million for the Louisiana Seafood Promotion and Marketing Board, $8 million for direct financial assistance to alligator farmers, $25.5 million to complete the Sugarcane Research Laboratory, $12 million for the restoration of wildlife management areas and $28 million for the restoration and rehabilitation of forestlands. The Louisiana legislators appear committed to grabbing as much as they can even if they cannot spend it effectively. For instance, they request $7 billion for rebuilding evacuation and energy supply routes on top of $5 billion for expansion of road and transit capacity. They also demand $20 million for the establishment of development plans for development districts in the State of Louisiana.

Newt suggests that if the government doesn't get on track by focusing on wise and efficient spending that places a cut-off valve on wasteful pork sometimes soon, our children and grandchildren will suffer from this spending spree down the road when the bills come in and the taxman starts knocking on their door via higher taxes. Luckily, we have a small government voice like Newt who isn't afraid to take out a hatchet and chop away at the strangling vines of excessive pork barrel spending that Congress seems to salivate over. Now their are a lot of hold-overs from the Class of 1994 who still sit in Congress and believe in cutting fat from the budget and reducing government but maybe the leadership should take note of Newt's and countless Americans concerns about this blank check mentality running rampant in D.C. We need more folks with ideas like Newt in Congress or eventually in the White House come 2008. Hopefully, Newt will get some ideas from his listening tour of America and take up the challenge.