Porker of the Month: Rep. Maxine Waters

Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) has named



Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) Porker of the Month for provoking a tussle with House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey (D-Wis.) over her intention to obtain an earmark for the Maxine Waters Employment Preparation Center, a facility within the Los Angeles school system. Rep. Waters’ grandiose gesture is a reminder that Congress still has not banned the practice of earmarking taxpayer funds for pork projects, including monuments, academic facilities, roads, airports and water projects, that are named after themselves. Rep. Obey appears to grasp that such narcissistic expenditures fuel the negative image of Congress and is proactively trying to keep them out of the fiscal year 2010 appropriations bills, particularly since Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) has successfully attached amendments to ban such projects to several appropriations bills. To placate Rep. Waters' need for recognition and the desire of some members of Congress to leave behind a living legacy, even one that is built with pork-barrel earmarks, CAGW happily obliges, endowing Rep. Waters with the coveted June Porker of the Month.



Click on title above to go to "Citizens Against Gov't Waste" website to read more about the Porker of the Month Club and while you are there, be sure to visit the Porker Hall of Shame page;



http://www.cagw.org/site/PageServer?pagename=news_porkerofthemonth