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Editorial: Time to stop Senate secrets
The Birmingham (Ala.) News
September 2, 2006
The concept is brilliantly simple: Give taxpayers a searchable, online data base of federal grants and contracts so they know exactly who's getting their money, and from which member of Congress the spending earmark is coming.
That's the proposal one of the most conservative members of the U.S. Senate, Republican Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, and one of the most liberal, Democrat Barack Obama of Illinois, want enacted. Except a strangely twisted privilege senators allow themselves may keep billions of dollars in congressional pork-barrel spending as anonymous as it has always been.
The Coburn-Obama bill was zooming down the fast track to passage before Congress adjourned Aug. 4 for the current recess, but then a member of the Senate exercised what's known as a "secret hold" to keep the measure from coming to the floor. For a reason that can only be tied somehow to arrogance, Senate rules allow a single member to put a private hold on almost any type of legislation. That rule prevents the majority leader from bringing the bill to a vote unless the senator who placed the hold gives in and releases it.
Allowing any one senator to hold up a bill that a majority of Congress may support concedes far too much power to one individual; allowing a hold to be placed secretly is, well, as ridiculous as it sounds and goes against any semblance of transparency in government.
The senator holding up the pork-disclosure bill is no surprise, either: Sen. Ted Stevens, the Republican from Alaska who wants taxpayers to fund a $320 million "bridge to nowhere" in his state. Stevens' identity was revealed after conservative and liberal bloggers worked together for weeks to identify which member was responsible for holding the bill. At least Stevens admitted the act after being put on the spot. (Another suspect was Alabama Republican Richard Shelby, who was cleared, but refuses to say whether he supports the bill; Alabama's other senator, Republican Jeff Sessions, is a co-sponsor of the bill.)
There was a time not too long ago, it seems, when Republicans at least paid lip service to responsible spending. Now Stevens, one of the longest-serving Republicans, is stalling a bill that allows taxpayers to know where their money is going and who is responsible for sending it there.
This absurdity is underscored by Stevens' "reason" for placing the hold: He claims he doesn't want taxpayers to spend the $4 million to set up the database or the $2 million a year to maintain it.
A $320 million bridge to nowhere is fine; $2 million to track more than $2.5 trillion in federal spending each year is a waste of money.
Senators should throw out the rule that allows a member to hold up a bill anonymously. They also should pass the Coburn-Obama disclosure bill as soon as they return after Labor Day.
And they should do it all in the open.
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