Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., steered earmarks to some organizations with a board member who is also serving as a top bundler to his presidential campaign, according to the Next Right. This raises what for me is one of the primary questions about earmarks in general. Members of Congress say they know the needs of their states (or districts, in the case of House members). Whence comes this in-depth knowledge? Do they hear about needs from constituents, from their own personal observations, or do insiders–lobbyists, campaign contributors and others–educate them? Because the process is so opaque, in most cases we simply don’t know.
(Via InstaPundit.)
6 responses so far ↓
1 al france // Aug 17, 2008 at 12:53 am
could you tell me exactly what these earmarks were and who benefited? please excuse my ignorance but what is a bundler? isin’t the reason for running for office to do the will of the people who voted for your platform? why hasn’t dennis hastert been arrested and put on trial for his crimes?
2 Connie Miller // Aug 22, 2008 at 10:00 pm
In fairness, McCain’s earmarks should also be tabulated (it is acknowledged that he has many, many earmarks).
Next Right isn’t exactly an unbiased link.
This information should come from primary sources such as the Senators’ offices or budget records, not a right-wing smear blog.
Please answer this and the previous comment. I thought SunlightProjects.org was reputable when I heard of it on c-Span. Now I am dubious.
3 Anon Y Mous // Aug 23, 2008 at 11:50 am
Uhm, yeah… you’ve selected a 3rd party source for information with a clear agenda and bias. You just lost credibility. You need to use primary sources and do your own researth… and if you are going to list “earmarks” for one presidential candidate, you should list those of the other for balance… presenting both side-by-side would have been a very smart thing to do… “non-partisan” site this isn’t.
4 Bill Allison // Aug 23, 2008 at 1:14 pm
For the record …
Anu and I had looked into this ourselves. We didn’t posted anything on it, but we did find some of the same overlap as Next Right did. One of Obama’s bundlers identified by Public Citizen as a former lobbyist, Frank Clark, turns up on the board of a few nonprofits for which Obama secured earmarks. This page lists some: “Clark serves on the board of trustees of the Adler Planetarium and Astronomy Museum, DePaul University, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, University of Chicago Medical Center, and The Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum. He also is on the board of directors of Metropolitan Family Services, Governors State University Foundation, Illinois Manufacturers Association, Big Shoulders Fund, United Way of Metropolitan Chicago, the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation and the executive committee of The Chicago Community Trust.” Adler Planetarium got an earmark from Obama–can’t recall which of the others did without my notes, but here’s a list from the Washington Post — you can look for others yourself.
So contra Connie and Anon, we did check this out ourselves. And prior to the posting on Next Right, I spoke to two reporters from main stream outlets who were looking into this, independently of one another, to see what I thought, and I pretty much said the same thing–that lawmakers end up knowing their districts or states not always through firsthand experience but rather through the eyes of their big contributors and lobbyists.
As for McCain, he doesn’t ask for earmarks–at least not since earmark disclosure required Senators to be identified along with their earmarks. We have posted on McCain though.
Finally, if you’re going to argue we can’t link to any source that might have a partisan edge, that’s going to eliminate a whole lot of the blogosphere, and I’m not willing to do that. 99 44/100s percent of campaign coverage and analysis from mainstream reporters will come from talking to partisans and folks with an axe of one kind or another to grind. At RealTime, we identify our sources and provide you with the information we relied on. I think that openness makes us fairly credible.
5 Carl von Mehren // Aug 30, 2008 at 8:47 pm
One poster says that it is acknowledged that McCain has many earmarls. NOTHING COULD BE FURTHER FROM THE TRUTH. To the contrary, it is well known that there are five Senators, John McCain being the leading one, who have never requested or received earmarks. McCain has been fighting to end earmarks for years. Unfortunately this legal form of corruption is a major way politican get contribtutions and it will not be eliminated until the revolution comes. Get out your indian coustumes - the time is coming to dump the tea into the harbor.
6 Aaron // Sep 7, 2008 at 8:26 pm
“Clark serves on the board of trustees of the Adler Planetarium and Astronomy Museum, DePaul University, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, University of Chicago Medical Center, and The Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum. He also is on the board of directors of Metropolitan Family Services, Governors State University Foundation, Illinois Manufacturers Association, Big Shoulders Fund, United Way of Metropolitan Chicago, the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation and the executive committee of The Chicago Community Trust.”
Jeez… how could someone direct money anywhere in Chicago without that guy being on the board? Perhaps if he were involved in one or two concerns, and earmarks to them could be shown to be shady or unnecessary, then I’d be worried.
To Carol, in McCain has in fact requested earmarks. Unlike Sen. Obama, McCain doesn’t freely list his earmarks, so knowing them all takes a little more research than I’m capable of. Luckily, a left-leaning blog has done some of that work for me: http://thinkprogress.org/2008/01/06/mccain-earmark/
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