McCAIN SPONSORING ANTI-PORK LEGISLATION

Arizona Senator John McCain along with eight Republicans and two Democrats is sponsoring legislation designed to eliminate pork from being earmarked to legislation. This practice has caused a great deal of trouble in Congress, since earmarked projects are usually pet projects of Senators and Representatives tagged onto legislation at the last minute without going through committee and in most instances tagged to vital legislation that must be passed thus insuring that the pork finds the necessary funding. Many earmarks are also pork that is lobbied by PACS and tagged as favors by elected officials of both parties. In theory McCain's legislation sounds good, but I cannot help but be reminded of another piece of legislation that the Senator was involved in that also in theory sounded good but since has proven to be a disaster in many ways. The McCain/Fiengold Campaign Finance Reform in theory sounded great. It was designed to control soft money to help control individuals or corporations with a particular agenda from giving large amounts of cash to a candidate and in a sense purchasing that candidates loyalty when elected. The reality is that the legislation did stop soft money given directly to the candidate but allowed the creation of the 527's who became surrogates for the soft money and have poured unlimited funds into campaigns. The McCain/Fiengold bill also limits freedom of speech in the final days of an election since adds cannot run 60 days prior to a general election and 30 days prior to primaries. As this new bill by McCain unfolds it remains to be seen just how effective it will truly be. Will it actually address the real problem of lobbying and its influence on legislation or will it be a make over as McCain/Fiengold turned out to be. My gut instinct because of a genuine distrust of John McCain, the medias poster boy, is that this new bill will be similar to the last: failed legislation! Time will tell as it makes its way through committee and onto the House and Senate floor as we look at the heart of this legislation.

Ken Taylor