Candyman or Thief?

The Sacramento Bee's front page story today about how "most area lawmakers push projects, defend process" to get more federal dollars to their districts But their math is screwy. Two democrats, Mike Thompson and Doris Matsui, asked for a ton of dough for their districts ($402 and $453 million respectively), two republicans wanted a bit less (Wally Herger, $215 million and Dan Lungren $211 million). Tom McClintock asked for $0, because he opposes the system. One can bet that because of who is in the majority, the final distribution of the booty will be in about the same proportions.

There are two ways to look at the current system. First, it could be seen as a typical ward healer arrangement - which all elected officials should participate in. We've reduced legislators from thinking about the big issues that face us to becoming distributors of largesse. Since the system has grown up, the quality of legislating has gone down. Polling on the quality of elected officials has certainly reflected our opinions of the quality of the declining quality of their work. All of us can see the math. We send them $1 and they give us back (as Californians) about 80¢ - only a fool would take that deal. We're about 15% under the average "return" of federal dollars compared to other states in the west. That is made even more odd because although the federal government controls just over 29% of the land in the US, they control more than 45% in California.

The big "winners" in this race are states with small populations and lots of federal installations (Maine $1.41 and Alaska $1.81) and the south (MIssissippi $2.02, Alabama $1.63 and Louisiana $1.85). Are those the kinds of places we want to be like? The calculations do not include things like interest on the debt, which would further diminish the return to each state.

The alternative view is one that McClintock seems to reflect, we would all be better off if we did not have the system of earmarks. The problem with that approach is that many Americans have come to rely on the "constituent services" that congressional offices perform. I am willing to bet that Mr. McClintock does not eschew those staff to perform those functions.

Will Rogers once said "Be thankful we're not getting all the government we're paying for. " In this generation we are paying a lot more and getting a lot less.