Infrastructure and Earmarks

Topics Discussed

  • Stories from Texas and Infrastructure Needs

  • Moment of Hope: Vaccinations

  • Earmarks and the Federal Budget

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Episode Resources

Transcript

Sarah: [00:00:00] I think that there is, especially considering our previous conversation, because particularly when it comes to infrastructure, any spending at all is so difficult to get and people want it and people care, that you could see the influence of earmarks, because even a small project in the face of what feels like complete government inaction and increased pressure from climate change is going to make an impact. I don't really care where you live.

Sarah: This is Sarah

Beth: And Beth, 

Sarah: You're listening to Pantsuit Politics.

Beth: The home of grace-filled political conversations.

Sarah: [00:00:54] Welcome to another episode of Pantsuit Politics and welcome to all the new listeners who have found us through Apple's [00:01:00] spotlight program. I'm running out of new ways to say we're so honored to be included, but we are. And we really want you guys to head over to the website, PantsuitPoliticsShow.com and check out the full show notes because that's what contains all the links and more resources about the show and the transcript of the show that's not included necessarily in the show description. So head on over there and check out the full breadth of what we can offer you here at pantsuit politics. 

We hope you're enjoying listening. And today we are going to tackle what we've learned about climate change and infrastructure from the crisis in Texas. And it's going to feel like we're taking a hard turn to talk about earmarks, AKA pork barrel spending in Congress, but I am going to make the case that they are related. And then as always, we'll wrap up with what's on our mind outside politics. 

Beth: [00:01:46] We thought we'd start with a few updates from listeners in Texas. It's always best to listen to people on the ground and so let's listen to this message from Jessica. 

Jessica: [00:01:56] Hi there. Long time listener and avid fan here. [00:02:00] I thought I'd send this along because I know y'all value perspective. Since we're living through disaster one hour at a time right now, I thought I might use my brief flicker of power to send a message.

I started writing my feelings out last night and all those things look a bit brighter in the daytime as they usually do, things still aren't great here. I'm staring down the barrel of our third nights sleeping with our five and three-year-old crammed in our bed because we have no power and no hope that it will come on any time soon.

Temps are not quite as low, but still hovering in the twenties. This is Texas. We prepare for endless days of over 100 degree temps, not low teens. Snow is a once in a decade occurrence for most of us and it's usually a light dusting of powdered sugar that melts in hours.

 Yes, we were wholly unprepared. Our leaders failed to warn us, failed to shore up our grid in time. And we [00:03:00] failed to head weather warnings, thinking that it seemed to completely unlikely we'd even get snow, let alone days of freezing weather. Believe me, I am beyond angry with our leadership for failing us like this when they knew what might happen in this scenario.

The reality is stark and honestly kind of scary. We've gone days now, mostly without power. And now on a boil notice, we're trying to boil water using makeshift setups over our fireplaces and filling our bathtubs because we know that no power probably means no water comes next. We're joking with friends about digging holes in the ground for out houses, but it's not that far from reality right now.

We're worried about making sure friends' babies get milk and children are fed and warm. We're worried about our friends, relatives who need 24 hour care and can't be lifted in and out of beds by the one family member who made it to them. There's no firewood, [00:04:00] no propane, no charcoal, no bottled water either.

And where are we supposed to go in the middle of icy, treacherous roads in a global pandemic. Warming centers are starting up, but they're also a huge COVID risk. Grocery stores are empty again. It's like COVID panic all over again, but so much worse this time. We'd have to spend two days of driving across the four mentioned icy treacherous roads just to get to the state border. 

I hear all the northerners, clucking, their tongues and rolling their eyes at us like we are a silly children who forgot their homework and it is maddening. Again, I say we endured this days upon days of drought and 105 to 110 degree temperatures. We endure endless months of summer when nothing cools you off and even the local pool is the temperature of bath water. Our systems are designed to handle extreme heat. It doesn't get this cold here ever. I've lived in Texas, [00:05:00] almost all my life, and I've never seen these temperatures this far South. Climate change is real, and we are living through this scary, hard truth of that, right this minute.

 I am cold to my bones and I am one of the lucky ones who still has running water to boil and a gas fireplace that's still going. I am one of the lucky ones who's had the ability to get out and find provisions. We'll be fine. We have family nearby with more power and we can get to them if things get bad, but I'm one of the lucky ones and there are so many around me who are far less lucky and in far more real danger. You were already so tired, so frayed at the edges from a year of pandemic and loss and uncertainty, which makes this latest hit feel particularly brutal.

 So I guess I'll close by asking that y'all pray for us down here. We need it. And please be kind [00:06:00] and gentle. It's been a rough week. Thanks for listening. 

Beth: [00:06:04] Thank you, Jessica, for sharing that. We also heard from Tessa and Anna. Tessa had a family friend lose their home to a fire. They were using a generator to power oxygen equipment needed to keep someone in the home alive.

And the generator caused a fire and the home is completely lost. Anna lost power for 60 hours from Monday to Wednesday. Because of spotty cell service and battery conservation, she didn't really understand what was even happening across the state until Wednesday and those are just a few of the messages that we've received telling us about what it was like on the ground, in the real throws of this crisis.

And even though most people in Texas have had power and water restored, by the time you're hearing this podcast, we think one it's important to settle ourselves in the brutal tragedy that unfolded, and two, it is important to develop a sense of what could happen again and to keep in [00:07:00] mind, this is the cost of climate change.

I think the New York times put it so well in a piece that Texas has just a harbinger, like this is what's coming and we are going to have to make preparations. We have to get serious. Texas is telling us and Mississippi, I don't want to leave out Mississippi, which has had terrible, terrible issues with water as well, particularly in Jackson. We just have to understand and learn what we can and resist the temptation to criticize another state's approach without saying, what are we not ready for here? Because it could come.

Sarah: [00:07:46] We've had so many Harbinger's right. We've watched the wildfires in California, much less Australia. We've seen hurricanes in Texas. Some people in Houston have not recovered from hurricane Harvey before they were faced with [00:08:00] this new crisis. We have hurricanes in the Northeast. We have flooding in the Midwest and every time we use words like historic, unprecedented, I don't know if it's because, listen, Texas knows this, it has a reputation for independence. 

It has political leaders who made some really cruel and terrible choices with their political rhetoric when other parts of the country were suffering under the effects of climate change. That attitude and that reputation that has, that has brought this home to Texas and to some other parts of the country.

But I don't know how at this point you could look across our nation and the world and see that this is coming for each and every one of us, that the idea that we are even speaking of these as natural disasters, instead of climate change coming knocking is bananas to me. It does feel like the, the rhetoric has [00:09:00] shifted.

And I don't know if it was how terrible this particular crisis was and that, and then as we're about to talk about it got to some really basic infrastructure problems when people don't have power and water in such huge proportions and huge numbers for long periods of time, that really gets people's attention.

But it does feel to me a little bit like this has shifted, or maybe it's, again, that it's on top of a global pandemic. But it does feel like every time and there will be another one soon that another massive event like this happens, we get closer to the realization like this is the new normal. We shouldn't use unprecedented and historic anymore because this is what life is going to be like. 

This is the pressure that is going to continue to build on our infrastructure, on our utilities, on our homes, because that's the thing in Texas, right. They got water and power back. And so then their homes were flooded from burst pipes and all kinds of other issues. Or they're like, Some of our listeners were pointing out, some of them were just [00:10:00] cleaning up from fires and that's not even touching on the loss of life. So, you know, I think that, that, I hope desperately that this is finally like, we are starting to feel this in our bones, that everything is different now. 

Beth: [00:10:15] It's difficult to talk about infrastructure in the United States for a ton of reasons. We've been waiting for an infrastructure bill coming out from Congress for so long that it's a punchline. 

Sarah: [00:10:27] Infrastructure week. 

Beth: [00:10:28] And we have needed infrastructure upgrades desperately for at least a decade on a very broad scale. 

Sarah: [00:10:36] Yeah, I think that's generous.

Beth: [00:10:37] I think that's really generous, really generous the systems that carry our water, that manage our sewage, that deal with our power lines, most of them were built after world war two and assumed that the conditions of the world would remain static and even had, they remained static, those systems were going to need some upgrades, occasionally. Nothing is [00:11:00] static, right? We have technology on the great side that allows us to do much of this work differently and more efficiently.

And we have climate change pressing us to be ready for more extremes in temperature, more extremes in weather events. And I worry sometimes when I hear members of Congress talking about, Oh, I've got my infrastructure asks ready, like which decade are those asks oriented in? Because often in Kentucky, at least when you talk infrastructure, what they're talking about is asphalt.

Like just upgrading our existing highways and those needs exist but that is just the beginning of the needs that exist. And we're talking when we think climate change about things like water and power, really basic issues. It doesn't even countenance like broadband and some of the major infrastructure needs that exist across the country.

Sarah: [00:11:52] So let's break some of these systems down. So with water. It's really hard to talk about our water infrastructure without talking about our sewer infrastructure. [00:12:00] So listen with a lot of sewer infrastructure, we're not even talking about world war II. We're talking about the early 19 hundreds. So in Paducah and exciting news for all of y'all who were intrigued by our previous sewer discussion, I've convinced the head of our sewer board that I spoke about on a previous episode to come and talk to us.

So he's going to be on here saying, and he'll, we'll talk about this in more detail, but. So many of the sewer systems that were built in the early 19 hundreds, are combined sewer systems. So the storm water and the sewer systems are running through the same pipes and if the stormwater runs high enough, it overflows this little bump that divides them and mixes us with the sewer.

And then it all flows out to the river and where I live in a lot of places, which is not, um, that's not what we want. We don't want sewer even mixed with a lot of rainwater flowing into our waterways obvi, but that's the best they had. Right. 

And there was, that was also built on the assumption of much less flooding then we deal with now, even the dams that were built in the sixties and seventies were built [00:13:00] on a basis of much less flooding, much less rainwater. This is something that's come up where I live so often.

 And when I was a city commissioner, not to, you know, we speak about 500 year floods and 100 year floods in a way that's even assuming a regular sort of rainwater event is confusing language to the average citizen, but it's definitely confusing when, who the heck knows what that means in the face of climate change. What is a hundred year event happening every 10 years mean in the face of climate change? 

Beth: [00:13:31] So that's the water side. On the power side, we just saw that freezing temperatures can trigger shutdowns. And I want to be sure to say in the midst of a lot of postmortems figuring out what happened with Texas' authority, that overseas it's electricity, ERCOT. That yes, there were things that they were unprepared for and also they did some things that worked and that prevented this from being much, much worse.

Sarah: [00:13:57] Well, and I think another important thing to point out is it's it's [00:14:00] not as if Texas doesn't have the capacity. The capacity they needed, even in the face of this winter is like half of what they need to run everybody's air conditioners in hundred degree weather. Like that's what our listener was talking about, right? 

Like it's not that they don't have capacity to run at really high levels. They definitely need it. And the depths of summer, it's just the way that the power grid works. They weren't prepared for that surge in cold weather. And I think that it's not this like fundamental flaw. It's just this idea of are we prepared for the way that climate change draws on energy reserves that we're not used to using at certain times of year. 

Beth: [00:14:41] And it's even hard to talk about energy reserves because most energy is not stored well. So it's not like you can just sit on extra energy. Most power has to be consumed as it's being produced.

Sarah: [00:14:53] We're so close to cracking that nut, but we're just not quite there.

Beth: [00:14:56] Not quite there yet and that is the key to a more [00:15:00] sustainable use of energy. But right now, Winter conditions that are unexpected can have actual equipment problems. And at the same time, you have much, much greater demand for power as everyone's cranking their heat up.

And if the power system has all this demand hitting it at the same time that it's output is, is naturally lower and play and lower because it's planned to be lower and then also you have systems going down because of conditions on the equipment caused by the freezing temperature. Had ERCOT not acted to shut some of the power down, you could have seen actual explosions. 

And equipment, not just down but damaged and you would be talking about months and months of repairs and months and months before some parts of Texas got power again. So there were some failures, there were also some successes. They were painful successes, the kind of successes that come when all options are bad options.

But [00:16:00] thank goodness people at ERCOT noticed what was happening and acted quickly. It's not only freezing temperatures that can cause power outages, severe heat waves also reduce the efficiency of fossil fuel generators. They interfere with transmission lines, severe heat can shut down natural gas plants.

Even solar panels can operate less efficiently with severe heat waves and droughts become a problem around hydroelectric power, power lines can spark wildfires when they're down. So we have just any kind of condition outside the range of normal that we prepare for can significantly influence our ability to keep everyone's lights on.

Sarah: [00:16:45] And so that's water and power. We haven't even gotten to roads. Another very populous state, California saw a section of its highway one collapsed into the Pacific ocean this year. And that was, they believed was caused by heavy rain that caused a debris flow of trees and boulders and water and [00:17:00] mud and undermined the highway itself.

And this is massively important highway, not just to California. I don't think a lot of people like commute on highway one, but it's a huge tourist attraction. You and I took it when we were in California and this coastal erosion, which increases the risk of land slide, is a huge issue. Some government estimates, more than 60,000 miles of roads and bridges in coastal flood plains that are very, very vulnerable to extreme storms and hurricanes and the flooding that results from that.

Beth: [00:17:30] And as we continue to think about roads and other forms of transportation, Amtrak is at risk from climate change. In 2017 consultants took a look at what extreme flooding and storm surges could cause. And they found that the track bed could be eroded, signals disabled, and the tracks could go underwater and they recommended preparing for this with flood barriers. Those flood barriers would cost $24 million per mile and they have to be [00:18:00] moved into place whenever the flood threat is recognized, it's not something that can just be there and ready to spring into action when we need it. 

So again, not a great solution, but when you think about the cost of the solutions and you compare them to the cost of acting after the devastation has occurred, It is difficult to argue that we are saving money by going cheap in our preparation for extreme weather. If you look at what's going out of FEMA year over year for disasters, it's clear that we're being penny wise and pound foolish to use that old expression. 

Sarah: [00:18:38] Well, and it's just not sustainable. We can not continue to fund natural disasters at the federal level like we have. That sort of what upsets me when we talk about deficits. And everybody's so concerned about government deficits and government spending, look at what's going on with the federal funding of natural disaster cleanups. It's we can't, we cannot continue on this path. If [00:19:00] you want to talk about a sustainable financial path, that ain't it. We haven't even talked about Superfund cleanup sites.

Two thirds of the Superfund cleanup sites are at risk of flooding, storm surge, wildfires, and sea level rise. And this is very personal to me as the Paducah gaseous diffusion plant is in fact, is in fact, a Superfund site, where there's a massive amount of environmental cleanup. And so obviously any sort of flooding or climate change pressure brought on by hurricanes or wildfiresput those Superfund sites in the environmental cleanup at risk, which puts the surrounding populations at risk for that spreading, for that environmental risk, the toxins, the pollutants, and all the things in the ground, depending on what Superfund you're talking about at risk of spreading out, even wider into the community.

You know, I think that all of these things are that it's all just coming to bear and it feels like to me, like we built so much of our infrastructure under a completely different understanding [00:20:00] and a completely different sort of cultural narratives surr government. There's a much more activist government. There were way higher tax rates.

 And we have shifted our ideas about government and continue to reduce taxes and reduce taxes and get government out of the way and reduce taxes while we were needing to maintain them period much less with this added burden, this added pressure of climate change. And so now it's all coming to bear at the same time and we are going to have to really reevaluate the government's role.

And what that means is our role in helping our fellow citizens in the face of natural disaster, preventing the risks of extreme weather through a lot of spending. I don't think there's a cheap way to get out of any of this. I don't see how we even begin to [00:21:00] tackle it without a massive outlay of federal spending.

Beth: [00:21:06] Okay. And it's really hard to know who oversees that and how to prioritize issues in different parts of the country. It's hard to know how to regulate these things. Something that I've been really interested in learning more about as I've come to better understand how electricity is provided in Texas and how electricity is provided elsewhere, is that when we talk about regulation versus no regulation, we're missing a piece of the conversation. Because in one sense, you would like to see strict just standards around capacity and reserves and connections to providers that can fill in the gap when parts of the grid go down, regulations about winterizing equipment.

I mean, there are certainly places where smarter and more stringent oversight is clearly needed. There's also the sense though, with [00:22:00] climate change in general, that we have parts of the United States where getting green power is just not available right now, because there's so much regulation that you have only one utility provider. And so consumers don't have an option to get greener energy, or they can only get it if they pay a premium, which seems bananas to me. Yeah. 

Sarah: [00:22:21] We're definitely limited here in Kentucky. Coal country. Can't imagine why. 

Beth: [00:22:24] When you would think we would be having attacks on people who choose fossil fuel energy versus attacks on people who choose green energy, but anyway, you have to find, I think with everything related to climate change, this is true about electric vehicles, which I've been talking about on Patreon this week, the balance that allows for innovation to continue. Because innovation around renewable energy, it's moving at a very fast pace and we want it to continue to do so. And we want innovation around electric vehicles to continue to move at a very fast pace. And we want fewer people driving cars in general. 

So what [00:23:00] other forms of transportation can we imagine that run on renewable energy? You don't want to regulate yourself out of good ideas, being able to hit the market and you want those regulations to be smart regulations, and there's a real tension, and this is something that's going to come up over and over in the Biden agenda.

There is a tension between climate activists who say move things forward as fast as you can and labor activist who say yes, but slow it down enough for us to catch up our supply chain in the United States. States so that all of this new green sustainable manufacturing can happen here and result in high paying union jobs.

Sarah: [00:23:41] Well, and there's a tension on the government side with innovation as well, because often that comes from government supported research that's not profitable yet. And we need funding for that so that we can find innovation before it makes sense for private industry to get involved. You know, so I think that's a component of it.

I also think [00:24:00] that as much as I believe that there is a huge role for the federal government and spending on this infrastructure, I also think that there's a lot of money to be made in the private industry. I've read so many interesting articles from people, even people who used to be involved in the fossil fuel industry that are like, Oh no. Like if you want to make money, if you want to be where we're going next and you better get involved with sustainable energy right now, or you're going to miss the boat. 

Look at Exxon's profits. Look at how they've tanked, no pun intended, over the last few quarters. I mean, I think that that's, that's indicative in like places like Texas, places like Kentucky that have people that have made a lot of money on fossil fuel energy.

I'm just hoping that like they see there's also money to be made here and keeping States tied to an industry that is dying and not just because of federal regulation, but because it's where the economy is going, that's not wise either. Like, you know, that's just a, such a [00:25:00] short term outlook when it's not just that we need to spend money, but there's also money to be made by this tr.

Beth: [00:25:06] And I will say, I think it needs to be a transition. I was watching the circus this weekend. John Heilemann, Mark McKinnon, Jennifer Palmieri, and Alice Wagner show on Showtime. And they were in Montana talking to Senator John Tester, and they were asking him about what he can support in the Biden agenda in terms of climate change.

And he was standing outside next to a tractor that he used to pull one of their vehicles off the side of the road cause they had veered off in the snow and he said, look, I raise food, not just for my family, but for the entire United States of America. And we don't have anything to put in the tanks of the equipment that enable us to raise this food yet besides fossil fuels.

 So if we're talking about just turning that supply off, I'm out. If we're talking about moving [00:26:00] forward in a better direction, taking one step at a time, then I'm paraphrasing, but yes, I can support that. And I thought, I think that's what everybody's talking about for the most part. You know, I just want to emphasize, like, to me, oil and gas and coal are probably not going away anytime in the next five to 10 years completely.

 But it's sort of tipping the balance, right. And moving them to last resort or certain applications only, and seeing what we can accomplish with green energy that I'm really supportive of. I do think we need a real transition and managing that transition is going to be hard. Those research and development dollars that you talked about from the federal government, sarah, I believe those are crucial and I think one of our obligations as citizens is to accept some failure in that research and development. And that is very hard and it's not built into our psyche, right?

A government success is something like the vaccines. The government put a bunch [00:27:00] of money into, uh, guaranteeing a market for vaccines should they be successful and it worked. There are going to be times when it doesn't work and that is really, really difficult to think about but as I look at where we are with climate change and infrastructure, I'm ready to tolerate some level of failure in pursuit of what I think is the most important thing our government could be working on right now.

Sarah: [00:27:26] Well, that's a good transition to our moment of hope before we move on to our main segment, which is about vaccines this week. We have another vaccine on the horizon, as we record on Thursday, we've gotten the data back from Johnson and Johnson before the CDC. They like what they see. That's highly effective. And then the Biden administration is hopefully going to have doses shipped out by next week. 

Beth: [00:27:45] And it's just one dose, which is fantastic. I mean, just the logistics that it cuts down on to be able to take one dose and finish is really exciting. 

Sarah: [00:27:54] And then I received the first dose of my vaccine yesterday. Here's [00:28:00] a fun story everyone's going to enjoy. I'm a court appointed special advocate. A Casa is what they're called. And I really love this work. It's very rewarding. And I had an email from Casa in my email trashcan from January telling me that I'm actually in 1a due to my role as a Casa and I've could have gotten the vaccine weeks ago.

Will my husband let me live this down until the next pandemic probably not. I get a lot of emails. I really don't know what to say except for, I I'm glad I got it now. And I'm feeling very blessed and very sore and my left arm. And then you're scheduled to get yours tomorrow. I 

Beth: [00:28:36] am. I coached the academic team for two local schools with my husband and did not know that that made me eligible as a volunteer.

Sarah: [00:28:45] Because Kentucky has very much prioritized school reopening and therefore, any teacher or anybody that works in a school. 

Beth: [00:28:52] I did know that I would be eligible in the group that opens up on March 1st. And so Sarah was encouraging me to go ahead and make my appointment. [00:29:00] And when I took the quiz about eligibility, it told me that I could go right now.

And there were, when I booked my appointment, there were probably 30 appointments available this week. Yeah. And so I did my whole, like every negative attribute of my personality came out in the process of deciding whether to schedule this appointment or not. And ultimately I told myself, Beth, like all the people who are waiting for vaccines across the country are not going to get those shots faster because you don't make this appointment.

And I do very much believe the public health pronouncement that every shot in an arm is a good shot. And so, uh, decided to do it and I'm still feeling like a lot of sensitivity for people who wish that they could get their vaccine or someone they love could get it. And also a lot of gratitude that, that I'll be getting that first shot tomorrow.

Sarah: [00:29:50] Well, and I'm very grateful for our Kentucky leadership. They've done a fantastic job, a hundred percent. When it's okay. I'm going to give them big kisses right on the [00:30:00] mouth. Because I just think like it's, it's part because obviously we have a much smaller population, so the task is easier, but they have very much prioritized anybody that works with a kid or in the school system.

Like they're probably already, I mean, our teachers got there last dose yesterday. And we're planning on starting back to school on March 8th. So our Lieutenant governor Jacqueline Coleman is a teacher herself and just like the prioritization of this, uh, just, it speaks volumes about their values. And it means a lot to me. This is another moment of hope. 

Beth: [00:30:31] And listen, there are going to be people in Kentucky who have not had positive vaccine experiences. I think with everything that related to the pandemic and listen, everything else in life, experiences are uneven and we all have very strong, sensitive, tender feelings about what's going on with the vaccines right now.

And so I want to make a lot of room for that as we have this conversation and as we all make our different decisions and go through our days, but I do feel a lot of [00:31:00] gratitude for what, at least in my part of Kentucky appears to be a very successful vaccine rollout.

Sarah: [00:31:18] So following on our conversation of infrastructure and government spending, it seemed very appropriate that house appropriations chair, Rosa DeLauro, who's popping up left and right. She's working her little booty off over there between that and the child tax credits finally come into bear and her counterpart in the Senate, Patrick Leahy are going to introduce legislation returnee earmarks to the appropriations process. 

What are earmarks you're maybe be asking yourself. They're often known as pork barrel spending. They got a real bad rap for a long time. There's been a moratorium since 2011, but I love this definition by Diana Evans who's an expert on earmarks and a political scientist at Trinity college.

She says, an earmark is money provided for an individual project [00:32:00] in an elected officials district as a way of encouraging that officials vote for a spending bill. Now, Beth, you've done some deep dives into how our spending process is supposed to work our budgeting process. So talk about that so we can talk about why earmarks are important 

Beth: [00:32:15] Congress, as we know, has the power of the purse under the constitution, but the amount of spending that happens at the federal level is much too big and complex for Congress to exercise micromanagement of. So Congress first goes through the authorization process where they say, here are the programs that are going to exist under our federal government. We will spend enough money to have these programs. 

And then they go through the appropriations process where they more carefully designate how funds are going to be directed through the various executive branch agencies. And that's really when we shift from Congress and its oversight of money to the executive branch and all of the executive branch agencies [00:33:00] have either formula driven processes for spending money, or they go through competitive bidding processes to decide what vendor are we going to use? What kind of contract are we going to have with that vendor? And it's all very tightly controlled to make sure that it's done in a fair and transparent way. And 

Sarah: [00:33:16] that's usually what you're seeing when people talk about the president's budget, which is kind of confusing since Congress has the power of the purse the way we talk about it. 

Beth: [00:33:24] It is. The president's budget is what the executive branch tells Congress it needs to continue doing the things Congress has asked it to do. So the that's a really good point, Sarah, it originates with the executive, it goes over to Congress to do their thing, and then it comes back to the executive for implementation. And so earmarks are in a way an opportunity for Congress to flex its power of the purse muscles, by getting more directly involved in how money is spent.

And one of the arguments that you've seen over time advanced by both Democrats and Republicans is that [00:34:00] earmarks are unquestionably constitutional exercises of power that uniquely belongs to Congress. But Congress is set up to care about specific parts of the country. We elect representatives for particular districts for a reason, and that is to have those particular districts needs as part of Congress exercising its power and earmarks are a way to allow members of Congress to do that. That's how the argument for earmarks under the constitution goes. 

Sarah: [00:34:31] Well, because under the budgeting process we're supposed to get, what is it? 12 big appropriation bills because our federal government is massive. And the idea that, uh, Lone congressperson from Iowa or Illinois or Indiana, I'm going with the I states, could sit down and look at the entire federal budget it's ludicrous. So they're like, okay, well we'll break it up. Except for they have not done that in like ever a long time and actually aligns very nicely with the [00:35:00] moratorium on earmarks in 2011.

From that time period until fiscal year 2018, only one individual appropriations bill was enacted. Rather than the 84 appropriation bills Congress should have passed. Instead, what they've been using to fund the government are these massive omnibus bills, which you've probably heard that word before or continuing resolutions.

And they're huge and massive and virtually impossible for any individual congressperson to go through and understand what's in them. And so the idea is well, okay if we bring back earmarks at the very least, maybe we can start breaking up these massive omnibuses or these continuing resolutions and go back to the budgeting process as it was meant to be, which is smaller appropriation bills broken up by subject matter.

The 

Beth: [00:35:43] other argument in favor of earmarks that I find personally very compelling is that member directed spending, which is another way to talk about earmarks, happens whether it happens through Congress or not. [00:36:00] People pick up the phone and ask for the executive branch to do certain things in their districts, in return for other things.

And we can all sit here and be very like high horse about that, or just recognize that people do each other favors in life and these are people. And so one of the arguments against earmarks is that it is not very transparent, but it going through legislation is much more transparent than someone picking up the phone and leaning on someone else to do them a favor.

Or members like trying to sneak in provisions by writing a program up that is so specific, it could only apply to the one thing that they're looking for. I think it is better on balance to have it all out there in the record where it can be analyzed by watchdog groups and relayed back to citizens, then have so much of it happening in a really opaque way.

Sarah: [00:36:53] Well, and now those watchdog groups and the stuff that came out is why we got the moratorium to begin with. Like it was [00:37:00] called pork and you would see Jeff Lake, like he was really opposed to earmarks for a long time, especially as a house member. When I was in the Senate, uh, Lord Coburn from Oklahoma was the bane of everybody's existence because he would go on and on and on about earmarks.

And these wasteful projects, every, the elder members of our audience will remember the bridge to nowhere. That was a, uh, infamous earmarked project. But. Here's what really always bugged me about it. Earmarks amounted to about 3% of Congress's discretionary budget and that discretionary budget as a percentage of the total federal spending amounts to about one third.

 So their discretionary budget is only a third of federal spending and earmarks are only 3% of that. It's a tiny amount of money overall, but it's easy to get on there and Crow about millions of dollars. I mean, you see that right now with the relief bill, Marsha Blackburn got on and listed all these things. Oh, see million dollar here and a million dollar here. And look at they're giving a million dollars to this climate change thing. Well, yeah. That sounds like a lot of money and it is a lot of money, but in a [00:38:00] $1.9 trillion bill, that's like 0.03%, come on.

 Like, it's not that I don't think that every dollar matters it does. And I it's like, I think you're right that I think more transparency is better, but the idea behind earmarks is that it gives something for congressional leadership to bargain with. To say, if you vote for this particular appropriations bill, we'll put money in it for your district for this project. We need something besides the constant threat of primaries to grease the wheels a little bit.

I think that there needs to be something in this process that can lead to negotiation because. Right now there's, there's no negotiating happening. And look, there's an argument that this isn't going to make a difference that we're so polarized. We have like 16 members who live in a district carried by a presidential candidate of the other party.

So a truly swing district. It's [00:39:00] a very small amount of Congress. And most congressional members are, you know, more interested in being on Fox news or going viral on Instagram than they are with legislators. I will till my dying days, remember that leaked memo from Madison Cawthorne saying I'm focusing on communications and not legislation.

And, you know, with everything being nationalized who's to say voters even care if you brought money to your district, right. It's particularly, I think a hard sell for Republicans because they're more rewarded for cutting government spending in every turn than they are for spending even in their own district.

Beth: [00:39:36] I don't know that that's true though, having observed Senator McConnell run several times in our state because he is very quick to point out what he's brought home to Kentucky. Yeah. 

Sarah: [00:39:45] But Senate is really different from house. Don't you think? 

Beth: [00:39:48] That's true, but I think that if you look at Senator McConnell, it's another place to question how you want this process to happen. Because Senator McConnell also had several achievements happen for Kentucky [00:40:00] while his wife was the secretary of transportation. Again, there is influence happening, um, through a variety of things and there always will be, you know, bringing earmarks back isn't going to solve that kind of influence either.

 But there's something in it for Republicans and, and McConnell has been kind of mum on the earmarks issue because he liked them. He knows that this is helpful. And so I think it's going to be really interesting to see the politics of this play out. You have the tea party, the Jim Jordan types who really don't want to do anything with government and are just about opposing whatever Democrats want. You have them coming out swinging against this hard, but I think you could have a very bipartisan group in favor of reinstating earmarks and a very bipartisan group against it. I, 

Sarah: [00:40:47] you know, I think the, the critique that it doesn't matter. You know, there was a quote in one article, a GOP consultant said accomplishments have never met less than a Republican primary. It's all about conviction and grievance. [00:41:00] And, you know, I think that's true to a certain extent, but I think when you talk about this, it's like a chicken or egg are earmarks useless in the face of polarization, or did the absence of earmarks make polarization worse?

And I don't, you know, I don't think there's one easy answer. I think there's a lot of things at play when we talk about the increased polarization, particularly gerrymandering, but I don't think it matters not at all. And I think if leadership would actually enforce the system and say, if you do not vote for this, I will remove the earmark.

I think there's a lot of times where they were voting, no, and still getting the earmark. And that's what we need to be like a little more enforceable,  little more forceful with, doing the carrot and the stick. But I think that there is especially considering our previous conversation, because particularly when it comes to infrastructure, any spending at all is so difficult to get and people want it and people care, that you could see the influence of earmarks, because even a small project in the face of what feels [00:42:00] like complete government and action and increased pressure from climate change is going to make an impact. I don't really care where you live. 

Beth: [00:42:07] I agree with that. I think there are problems with ear mark's for sure. I can imagine myself being exceptionally frustrated through this process. I can imagine myself, I hate to say this, but doing kind of a Marsha Blackburn sometimes and saying, can you believe everything that is rolled into this one bill? Like, I completely get that perspective and, and think it's needed in a lot of ways.

And I also think that this perhaps is a way to restart the engine of Congress in, at a time when we desperately need their engine to be restarted. And so as a citizen, as I consider this, I think it again means like not just thoughtlessly sharing a meme that lists all these random numbers and banana sounding programs that they're going to, and really checking out what's happening and why it's happening and remembering that passing legislation through [00:43:00] Congress is really hard by design. And if we want things to get done, there are going to be a lot of trade-offs in that. And so, you know, this is just another place where I think I just have to recognize that nothing's going to bat a thousand that's okay. 

Sarah: [00:43:16] Well, and we're Kentucky and so we're legally obligated to say, yay for pork.

Beth: [00:43:29] I thought maybe we could end today with a poem for our outside of politics section that I listened to as I was doing a yoga class for when you are feeling kinda down from Melissa West to is a relatively new yoga teacher to me. I don't know how long her YouTube channel has been at, but I think she's excellent.

But she read this poem called "A Blessing for a Friend on the Arrival of Illness" by John O'Donohue. And it struck me as I was listening to it, that it is a perfect way to orient [00:44:00] ourselves as we think about climate change. 

Now is the time of dark invitation beyond a frontier that you did not expect. Abruptly, your old life seems distant. You barely noticed how each day opened a path through fields never questioned, yet expected deep down to hold treasure. Now your time on earth becomes full of threat. Before your eyes, your future shrinks. You live absorbed in the day to day. So continuous with everything around you that you could forget you were separate.

Now this dark companion has come between you. Distances have opened in your eyes. You feel that against your will a stranger has married your heart. Nothing before has made you feel so isolated and loss. When the reverberations of shock subside in you, may grace come to restore you to balance. May it shape a new space in your heart to embrace this illness as a teacher who has come to open your life to new worlds. May you find in yourself a courageous hospitality towards what is difficult, painful, and unknown.

Sarah: [00:44:59] May you use [00:45:00] this illness as a lantern to eliminate the new qualities that will emerge in you. May the fragile harvesting of the slow light help you to release whatever has become false in you. May you trust the slight declare a path through all the fog of old unease and anxiety until you feel arising within you a tranquility, profound enough to call the storm to stillness.

May you find the wisdom to listen to your illness. Ask it why it came. Why it shows your friendship. Where it wants to take you. What it wants you to know. What quality of space it wants to create in you. What you need to learn to become more fully yourself, that your presence may shine in the world. May you keep faith with your body learning to see it as a Holy sanctuary, which can bring this night wound gradually towards the healing and freedom of Dawn.

Beth: [00:45:49] May you be granted the courage envisioned to work through pacivity and self pity. To see the beauty you can harvest from the riches of this dark invitation. May you learn to [00:46:00] receive it graciously and promise to learn swiftly that it may leave you newborn willing to dedicate your time to birth. 

Sarah: [00:46:07] Thank you for joining us for another episode of Pantsuit Politics, we will be back in your ears next Tuesday, and until then, keep it nuanced y'all.

Beth: Pantsuit Politics is produced by Studio D Podcast Production.  

Sarah: Alise Napp is our managing director. Dante Lima is the composer and performer of our theme music. 

Beth: Our show is listener supported. Special thanks to our executive producers. 

Sarah: David McWilliams. Ali Edwards, Martha Bronitsky, Amy Whited, 

Janice Elliot, Sarah Ralph, Barry Kaufman, Jeremy Sequoia, Laurie LaDow, Emily Neesley,  

Allison Luzader. Tracey Puthoff,  Danny Ozment, Molly Kohrs, Julie Hallar, 

Jared Minson, Marnie Johansson. The Kriebs! 

Beth: Shari Blem, Tiffany Hassler, Morgan McCue, Nicole Berkless, Linda Daniel, Joshua Allen, and Tim Miller. Sarah Greenup

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