Henry Waxman: The First House Democrat Swears Off Earmarks

Club For Growth reports on this statement from Henry Waxman :

After careful consideration I have decided that I will not request funding through the earmark process in the FY 20009 appropriations cycle.

We have a problem in Congress. Congressional spending through earmarks is out of control. When I was first elected to Congress in the 1970s, it wasn't unusual for an appropriations bill to be either completely free of earmarks or have just a few dozen special projects. That slowly changed, and by 1995 there were nearly 3,000 earmarks in that year's appropriations bills.

By 2005 the number of earmarks -- and the billions of dollars devoted to them -- had skyrocketed. The Congressional Research Service counted more than 15,800 earmarks in the 13 appropriations bills for fiscal year 2005 at a cost of over $27 billion. At the same time funding for some of our nation's most basic needs was being shortchanged.

We'll be waiting on so called fiscally conservative Republicans to match Waxman's courage.