Obama Releases '05, '06 Earmarks

For a few years, The Chicago Sun-Times's Lynn Sweet and others have been pestering Barack Obama to release his earmark requests from 2005 and 2006 (he's released his '07), and today, as the Senate prepared to debate the DeMint/McCain earmark amendment, Obama complied, and challenged Hillary Clinton to release hers for the corresponding period.

Here are Obama's '05 and '06 earmarks.

Opposing earmarks on principle aside, after glancing through them, I can't find any that seems inherently objectionable.

Comments

All told, Obama's earmarks have cost the US nearly as much as 20 seconds of the war on Iraq. End earmarks now!

Posted by neil | March 13, 2008 2:33 PM

FINALLY! I've been badgering Obama supporters about this for months now. Everytime I got a link to his most recent earmarks and not the '05,'06 or told to go google government.

I'm glad the double standard and hypocrisy from Obama's camp on transparency has ended.

Posted by Jesse | March 13, 2008 2:34 PM

His lack of earmarks just shows his lack of experience and his inability to get things done. Hillary is a fighter. She fights to bring back pork projects to her constituents in New York. She fights for those pharmaceutical lobbyists. She fights to maintain the status quo in Washington.

Obama can give all the pretty speeches he wants, but he can't match Hillary's fight.

Posted by Jayhawk Max | March 13, 2008 2:41 PM

Why oppose earmarks? It's about 1% of the federal budget. Entitlement spending eats up most of the budget leaving little in the way for discretionary spending. And for every bridge to nowhere there are many deserving projects ranging from repair of water infrasturcture to science research that is funded through earmarks. For those who oppose earmarks what is your solution to making sure some very worthwhile programs are funded? I'd be glad to here what you think.

Posted by Ben | March 13, 2008 2:51 PM

Jayhawk Max, Hillary may be a "fighter"... but she is not fighting for you or me. she is fighting for citizens of Clintonia.

Obama has been fighting for those who are not heard or who have been disregarded for over 20 years... Obama fights for the Spirit of America and the great country we can once again be.

Posted by moe.ron | March 13, 2008 2:55 PM

Jesse and Jayhawk, you two are on every board talking up the Killary team at any turn. You two had better start thinking before talking even though you are in the Killary category of making under 40K and having no education demography. Where are Killary earmarks? Where are her tax returns from 2000 to 2007? Wher are the donations to the Clinton library list?

Posted by Karen | March 13, 2008 2:59 PM

Oh look! Obama asked for money to shelter abused women & to help find missing children. What a scandal!

Posted by George | March 13, 2008 3:02 PM

Earmarks aren't inherently bad. In fact most to go worthy programs, and a congressman's job is to support and represent his/her own constituents.

Earmarks are only bad when they're used to repay political favors or benefit friends of the congressman. That's why transparency is the key.

Posted by TH | March 13, 2008 3:15 PM

Story of Obama's life. Despite being gifted with a spectacularly disproportionate set of "ears", he left no "earmarks" of note. A middling student from an insignificant little college who got an affirmative action ride to Harvard, where he remained until the age of 32.

Asked to publish something, the only thing he could come up with was a book length treatise on HIMSELF. Followed some years later by MYSELF PART II, and MYSELF PART III.

A few years as an uninspired and mediocre legal aid, then a few more years of ineffectual paper shuffling as a local politician.

Posted by robert ethan | March 13, 2008 3:17 PM

Obama requested $544,007,831 in earmarks in two years!! That's half a billion dollars of tax money that Obama wanted to put to special projects in just two years.

Earmarks are bad because they create the overspending and legislate to get re-elected mindset.

End the earmarking corruption! Vote McCain!

Posted by PB | March 13, 2008 3:18 PM

"The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public's money”.

Alexis de Tocqueville

Finish the earmarks!

Posted by apol | March 13, 2008 3:19 PM

Actually Karen, i'm a McCain supporter, although it should be mentioned that there is a democrat posting under the same name as me!

Bottom line is that earmarks breed corruption. Anything done by earmarks can be done by introducing a bill or an ammendment to a bill and then have a full up or down vote on the individual item. SO the arguement about worthy earmarks is silly.

They also MULTIPLY spending. Often times support will be purchased, via earmarks, for a large spending bill.

Posted by Jesse | March 13, 2008 3:26 PM

How dare Obama have earmarks for R&D, education, job programs and poor victims of domestic violence.. Shame on you for caring Barack Obama. SHAME ON YOU!!!!!!!!!!

Posted by Ann | March 13, 2008 3:56 PM

you know what Jayhawk? We live in the post 9/11 world. WE DON'T NEED A FIGHTER. WE NEED A LEADER, WHO CAN HEAL THIS DIVIDE THAT IS GROWING STRONGER EACH DAY. HRC FIGHTS IF AT ALL FOR POWER AND FOR HER TO WIN BY HOOK OR BY CROOK. SHE IS UNEXCEPTIONAL BORDERING ON DISASTROUS AS A CANDIDATE. OPERATION DESTROY OBAMA IS HARDLY FIGHTING. IT'S DESPERATION AND WE KNOW HOW GOOD THE CLINTONS ARE WHEN THEY ARE DESPERATE. WE ALLEED TO DUCK OR ELSE SUFFER THE CONSEQUENCES OF CLINTONS LACK OF CHARACTER AND MORAL COMPASS. NO WE HAD ENOUGH OF THEM. TIME TO MOVE ON TO SOMETHING DIFFERENT.

Posted by AP | March 13, 2008 3:58 PM

There is a potential conflict of interest here. Michelle Obama has been an employee of the Univesity of Chicago since 1996. In 2005, "she was appointed vice president of community and external affairs at the University of Chicago Medical Center. She also managed the business diversity program." - From Barackobama.com

Obama Requested $1 Million For Construction Of A New Hospital Pavilion At The University Of Chicago. In 2006, Obama requested that the University of Chicago receive $1 million to support its Construction of New Hospital Pavilion. For more than 75 years, the University of Chicago Hospitals (UCH) has provided state of the art medical care on the South Side of Chicago. UCH is one of the largest Medicaid providers in Illinois, and it provided more than $90 million in uncompensated care for Medicare and Medicaid patients this past year. To continue providing the best care for patients from all walks of life, UCH is proceeding with the construction of a new 600,000 square foot facility that will ensure their ability to provide the best care for patients well into the future. Funding will go towards assisting the construction and equipping a new hospital pavilion that will increase the Hospitals' clinical capacity by over one-third. [Obama Request Letter to the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water, 4/7/06]

Posted by Ephus | March 13, 2008 4:22 PM

Wow, I think my sarcasm was far too subtle.

Posted by Jayhawk Max | March 13, 2008 4:29 PM

Ben said... Entitlement spending eats up most of the budget leaving little in the way for discretionary spending.

And what entitlement programs are you referring to? Social Security? Medicare? They'll become a problem, but they currently provide a surplus of about $300 billion. Over $1 trillion of entitlement program surpluses have been consumed by Bush and the GOP controlled Congress over the course of 6 years, and there's no chance of fixing it until Bush and Dick "Deficits Don't Matter" Cheney are gone.

This is the norm for the GOP. Reagan jacked up the Soc Sec tax and then spent it all. George HW spent it all too. Neither even remotely tried to decrease the annual deficit, and year over year spending increases were out of control. (Sound familiar?)

The only one to ever have an actual budget surplus was Bill Clinton. It was just one year, and it was small, but it took him a tax hike that destroyed the Dem majority, firm control over spending increases, 8 years, and the Internet boom to get the mess he inherited into balance.

And before anybody starts trying to give credit to Gingrich and Co., reductions in the size of the annual deficit started in his first budget, not when the GOP became the majority in Congress. In fact, the GOP was screaming for tax cuts. If they had gotten there way, the debt hole would have been even bigger.

Posted by LFC | March 13, 2008 4:42 PM

Ephus the south of side of Chicago hospitals need all the help they can get.. You should go there sometime.

Posted by Ann | March 13, 2008 4:44 PM

I have no doubt that the South Side of Chicago needs all the hospital space it can get. That does not change the fact that it is a bad idea for Obama to earmarking funds to the institution that employs his wife (at more than $100k per year).

Obama should have made certain that Durbin handled all earmarks directed to University of Chicago.

Posted by Ephus | March 13, 2008 5:10 PM

Ephus the south of side of Chicago hospitals need all the help they can get.. You should go there sometime.

Posted by Ann | March 13, 2008 4:44 PM

They need so much help that they gave Michelle Obama a huge raise (nearly $200,000, more than doubling her salary) in 2005 after Barack got elected to the United States Senate.

Obama is a crook.

Posted by Joana | March 13, 2008 7:45 PM

McCains statement on earmarks, released this morning:

"I am proud to have fought against the practice of earmarking and wasteful pork-barrel spending. It has often been a lonely fight, but one I know is worth winning. I am encouraged by some of my Democratic colleagues' new-found enthusiasm for suspending this practice for a year. I hope their recent commitments do not wane once they step off the campaign trail. I believe we must end this process, which has diverted billions in taxpayer dollars to needless projects, once and for all. If voters give me the pen, I will veto every single pork-barrel bill Congress sends me.

"The American people demand that we introduce transparency and good judgment in how we spend their tax dollars. If projects like the proposed taxpayer-funded Woodstock concert museum were worthy national priorities, their funding would not be sought through appropriations earmarks, rather, they could withstand the public scrutiny of the regular legislative authorization process."

That's my guy.

Posted by Peter R. | March 13, 2008 7:57 PM

What I find amazing is that Mr. Ambinder can look at Obama's list of earmarks and finds nothing remarkable. Sadly, I think he represents most of the journalists-a nice guy but not very bright.

Posted by Kate | March 13, 2008 9:49 PM

Obama and EARmarks...you don't wanna go there.

Posted by interferon | March 13, 2008 11:43 PM

Jayhawk, some of us understood your sarcasm. Too bad about the others.

Speaking of which...I do wonder about some of the blog commenters. I thought I'd google 'robert ethan' because I found it really odd how someone could get that many facts wrong in one short post. Well, apparently robert is consistently delusional:
http://www.mydd.com/story/2008/1/23/164840/901

I guess he's one of those children left behind he've heard so much about. I suppose I could point him to Wikipedia since he obviously can't be bothered to read something as long as a book. (Well, maybe his attention span would last through 'The Pet Goat'.) But I don't know. What's that expression? "He's made his mind up - don't confuse him with facts."

As for Obama's earmarks, I didn't see any on the level of a Woodstock museum or 'bridge to nowhere' either, Marc. Kids, education, hospitals - what one would expect.

Posted by Tom J | March 14, 2008 12:13 AM

you will get what you deserve with Hillary and McWar ...

you folks are really sad, easily coerced, and have really short memories/attention spans ...

wake up, people ...

BUSH-CLINTON-CLINTON-BUSH-BUSH-?-?

I'm not sure which candidate will fill in those question marks, but I do know that choosing a Clinton or a McCain would make the chain look awfully depressing.

It would be interesting to see a reporter and historian team up to do an educational piece in the context of past candidates, their promises, and how they compare to the the current candidates that covers:

* the last time the average American could live comfortably and support a family on one salary
* the last time a college-educated student did not graduate from college eye-ball deep in debt
* empirical/quantitative evidence of how many democracies have been established by invasion and conquest
* Our China connection and how much muscular diplomacy has been used to gain concessions on the oppressed Tibetan people (btw, we did not seem to have any compunction about "negotiating or talking with this oppressive regime yet the Media and other candidates are terrifically excited to criticize Obama for speaking yet coming from a position of seeking concessions/movement on intractable issues
* The contamination of our food/water supply
* The overreaching and profit-minded pharmaceutical industry and the number of people that die every year because of faulty/toxic/knowingly dangerous drugs ...

But, that would be too much of a story, so instead of picking an item that means something to the average American placed in the context of history, prior candidacies, and future plans ...

we pick Geraldine Ferraro and Jeremiah Wright ... Buddhist Monks were gunned down in China yesterday.. what do the candidates think about that? What do their histories suggest about how they might handle China (an oppressive regime that Hillary and McCain had few problems "speaking/negotiating with" ?

Bravo. Keep up the good (lowercase g) work - what a great service to the Amercian people ... Sometimes I can't tell where the tabloids stop and the MSM starts .. Rupert Murdock has thoroughly changed the chessboard for spineless editors and journalists and so we get this divisive tripe that is designed to continue to influence Americans to vote AGAINST their own interests ...

WAKE UP

Posted by gary | March 16, 2008 5:49 PM

Friend in the Lord,

Please use this money for the churches and less privileged.

Greetings to you and your family in the name of God. In my search for a reliable and God fearing person and having gotten your contact through prayers and painstaking efforts I have decided to seek your help in carrying out my last wishes. My name is Mrs.Marvis Smith. I'm a 65 years old woman and from Congo. I was a merchant and owned two businesses in Dubai. I was also married with two children.

My husband and two children died in a car accident six years ago. Before this happened, my business and concern for making money was all I live for. I never really cared about other values in life. But since the loss of my family, I have found a new desire to assist helpless families. I have been helping orphans in orphanage/motherless homes. I have also donated some money for humanitarian needs in Sudan, South Africa, Cameroon, Brazil, Spain, Austria, Germany and some Asian countries. Only recently I saw on television the colossal loss of properties and livelihood people in Canberra, Australia through fire.

I was moving with great pity and compassion that I decided to make this contribution on assisting people over there, I kept $US15,000,000.00 Million in a long-term deposit account in a Finance company. Presently, I'm in a hospital where I have been undergoing treatment for oesophagi cancer. I have since lost my ability to talk and my doctors have told me that I have only few months to live. It is my last wish to see this money distributed to victims of the fire outbreak in Australia and other charity organization. Because relatives and friends have plundered so much of my wealth since my illness, I cannot live with the agony entrusting this huge responsibility to any of them.

Please, I beg you in the name of God to help me collect the deposit and distributes it accordingly. Use your judgment to distribute the money and keep 20% of it to yourself. Feel free to reimburse yourself when you have the money for any cost you incur during the process of collecting and distributing the money. If you are willing to help, please reply as soon as possible. May the good lord bless you and your family.Please the only thing you need to do is to pay for some docunents on my behalf.Please i want you to know that you are the only person that can take money from this fund.The bank can not dedect money from the fund.

Posted by smith | May 24, 2008 4:03 PM

Friend in the Lord,

Please use this money for the churches and less privileged.

Greetings to you and your family in the name of God. In my search for a reliable and God fearing person and having gotten your contact through prayers and painstaking efforts I have decided to seek your help in carrying out my last wishes. My name is Mrs.Marvis Smith. I'm a 65 years old woman and from Congo. I was a merchant and owned two businesses in Dubai. I was also married with two children.

My husband and two children died in a car accident six years ago. Before this happened, my business and concern for making money was all I live for. I never really cared about other values in life. But since the loss of my family, I have found a new desire to assist helpless families. I have been helping orphans in orphanage/motherless homes. I have also donated some money for humanitarian needs in Sudan, South Africa, Cameroon, Brazil, Spain, Austria, Germany and some Asian countries. Only recently I saw on television the colossal loss of properties and livelihood people in Canberra, Australia through fire.

I was moving with great pity and compassion that I decided to make this contribution on assisting people over there, I kept $US15,000,000.00 Million in a long-term deposit account in a Finance company. Presently, I'm in a hospital where I have been undergoing treatment for oesophagi cancer. I have since lost my ability to talk and my doctors have told me that I have only few months to live. It is my last wish to see this money distributed to victims of the fire outbreak in Australia and other charity organization. Because relatives and friends have plundered so much of my wealth since my illness, I cannot live with the agony entrusting this huge responsibility to any of them.

Please, I beg you in the name of God to help me collect the deposit and distributes it accordingly. Use your judgment to distribute the money and keep 20% of it to yourself. Feel free to reimburse yourself when you have the money for any cost you incur during the process of collecting and distributing the money. If you are willing to help, please reply as soon as possible. May the good lord bless you and your family.Please the only thing you need to do is to pay for some docunents on my behalf.Please i want you to know that you are the only person that can take money from this fund.The bank can not dedect money from the fund.

Posted by smith | May 24, 2008 4:04 PM