CONLEY COMMENTARY (WSAU) – Two weeks after the pork was stuffed into the Omnibus spending bill, the full story comes out.
Who was the lead Republican negotiator?
Indiana Senator Richard Shelby. He’s a totally disingenuous choice by minority leader Mitch McConnell. Shelby is retiring. So the party that preaches fiscal responsibility picked someone who is no longer accountable to the voters to cut a spending deal with democrats. So what we got was a bill that the larded up sufficiently to grease the skids to passage.
And, as noted in an earlier commentary, all of this had to be done before newly elected republicans could take their seats. Lame ducks, who were voted out of office or decided to retire, got more say in the next nine months of federal spending that newly elected candidates who stood before the voters and won. They were cut out of the process.
There are two members of congress who deserve public shame. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez got extra earmarks in the bill for her district. Then she objected that there wasn’t a path to citizenship for the scores of illegal immigrants in our country, so she voted ‘no’ but gladly accepted all the pork she was able to put in. Wisconsin’s Ron Kind, who has now retired, got a parting gift of $2-million in earmarks for his district. But before voting his office issued a press release calling his replacement, Derek Van Orden unfit for office.
Former Congressman Kind, if the person your district chose to send to Washington is so unacceptable, why didn’t you run for another term? The answer is self-evident, because Ron Kind’s district voted for Donald Trump two years ago. He narrowly won reelection in 2020. He didn’t want to end his political career with a defeat at the polls. So Citizen Kind, step aside. Your way of running the Government, where the party in power raids the treasury, needs to end.
Chris Conley
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