The system needs to be changed if we're going to address wasteful spending in govt. I laugh when republicans claim to be fiscal conservatives after their spending record. The dems start talking about putting a stop to pork spending? That can't be true, can it? No, it is absolutely not true.
From http://www.heritage.org/Research/Budget/bg2081.cfm:
"In addition to fiscal restraint, the Democratic majority pledged to rein in the use of pork-barrel projects, which had skyrocketed under the Repub lican majority and had prompted numerous crimi nal investigations of congressional corruption.
First, congressional Democrats pledged to clean up the earmark process. While the ethics bill signed by President Bush contained some reforms, such as required disclosure of the congressional sponsors of each earmark, lawmakers significantly weakened the rest of bill by:
Removing a provision to ban the trading of pork-barrel projects for votes,
Weakening provisions aimed at stopping ear marks that financially benefit lawmakers
Transferring Senate earmark enforcement powers from the neutral Senate parliamentarian to the par tisan Senate Majority Leader
Permitting votes onbills before disclosing ear marks
Weakening a provision requiring that earmarks be listed on the Internet before congressional votes.[24]
In addition to reversing earlier pledges, Congress limited these new earmarking rules solely to appropriation bills, choosing to ignore earmarks in tax, entitlement, and authorization bills.[25] Earlier this year, House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey (D-WI) tried to conceal all earmarks until after most of the spending bills had passed the House of Representatives, but he was eventually forced to back down after a public backlash. The Congressional Research Service recently announced that it will no longer track earmarks.[26] Thus, the Democratic majority's actions have fallen notably short of their reform rhetoric."
