In March, 2004, not long after the U.S. Navy had shipped off its official budget request for the next fiscal year, Admiral Vernon E. Clark, then Chief of Naval Operations, went shopping for more. Spending limits had forced the Navy to cut back on plenty of goodies it wanted, including a top-of-the-line Gulfstream jet. So Clark, the Navy's top-ranking officer, signed off on another, far less formal budget request, this one listing many projects that hadn't been funded. Soon that list began circulating among defense industry lobbyists, including those working for Gulfstream Aerospace Corp. and its parent, General Dynamics Corp. (GD ). They hit the halls of Congress, and by the time the 2005 defense budget passed four months later, the Navy got its new Gulfstream, courtesy of a special funding request known as an earmark. The Navy wasn't the only one happy with the behind-the-scenes deal. That one earmark alone was worth $53 million to Gulfstream, and it was just one of 29 earmarks valued at $169 million given to General Dynamics or its subsidiaries that year--quite a payout, especially considering that the company spent only $5.7 million on lobbying in 2004. Put another way, for every dollar it shelled out to lobbyists, it got almost $30 back in earmarks from Uncle Sam.
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