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Your Grandkid's Hero
By John Paulton
Citizen magazine
April 1, 2007
Tom Coburn says it’s immoral to impose a $450,000 "birth tax" on every American newborn.
He’s feisty and principled. His focus on his grandchildren’s future is matched only by his lack of concern about his own. For a politician, those are rare qualities. But they are exactly why Tom Coburn of Oklahoma—in the words of a fellow senator—"may be the most important member of the U.S. Senate right now."
In just two years in the Senate, Tom Coburn has emphatically made his mark. He has practically shut down the U.S. Senate with weeks’ worth of floor amendments. He has boldly challenged the wasteful spending practices of congressional leaders, Republican and Democrat alike. But among his many exploits, perhaps nothing stands out so much as his confrontation with the notorious practice by which Washington politicians slip funding for pet projects into appropriations bills. But what makes the practice of earmarking so insidious is that, often, virtually no one knows that the funding was added. In fact, earmarks are frequently inserted into the report that accompanies the legislation rather than the legislation itself, making them difficult to detect and impossible to vote on.
The use of earmarking has exploded—from just a few hundred in 1991 to nearly 14,000 in 2005. And it’s not just liberal, tax-and-spend Democrats who are doing it. Republicans get at least an equal share of the blame, maybe more. After all, it was under the Republican-controlled Congress that earmarking exploded, spurred on by GOP leaders who were concerned about protecting their newfound majority. In fact, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich specifically encouraged the practice as a means to safeguard politically vulnerable members—by helping them to "deliver" federal funds to their districts. With the leadership of the "Republican Revolution" giving an approving wink and nod, even otherwise conservative politicians came to accept earmarking as business as usual. Until Tom Coburn came back to Washington.
Getting Results
A few months into Coburn’s siege on earmarks, an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found that the public’s number one priority for Congress was the elimination of earmarks.
Coburn’s stand also had a powerful impact on fellow senators. Tom Coburn "has put some starch in the spine of fellow conservatives," according Ed Feulner of the Heritage Foundation, a leading opponent of earmarks. Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., a Coburn ally, described that impact this way: "When you’ve got someone like Sen. Coburn, you’re not so afraid to stick your toe in the water. He’s out there swimming in it, and it hasn’t killed him yet."
But he’s also begun making new converts, beyond the ranks of conservatives. Feulner cites a moderate Northeast Republican senator whom Coburn has helped to "see the light." Adds DeMint: "Some of these older guys are starting to see that this is the right thing to do—that we’re not going to get hurt back home for it. In fact, we’re going to get thanked for it."
Even devout liberals are fair game for Coburn’s evangelization on earmarks. Take Barack Obama, the ultra-liberal senator from Illinois. Coburn approached Obama with his idea for a bill that would require that all federal spending, including earmarks, be posted on a searchable Web site. Even though he and Obama have vastly different visions for what government should do, Coburn recognized that "it doesn’t matter if you’re a liberal or a conservative—nobody wants to waste money." Obama agreed, and together the unlikely pair authored the Coburn-Obama Transparency Bill. Last fall, a massive Internet effort exposed and ended a secret hold on the bill.
Another high point for Coburn occurred weeks later, when President Bush gave earmarks center stage in his 2007 State of the Union address. Chiding Congress to take action, the president said: "Over 90 percent of earmarks never make it to the floor of the House and Senate; they are dropped into committee reports that are not even part of the bill that arrives on my desk. You did not vote them into law. I did not sign them into law. Yet they are treated as if they have the force of law. The time has come to end this practice."
A Moral Issue
To Coburn, earmarking—along with the broader issue of out-of-control federal spending—is a moral issue, plain and simple. "I see it as the number one moral issue our nation is facing." According to Coburn, the average American newborn faces "a birth tax of about $450,000"—unfunded government liabilities that the child had nothing to do with creating but must somehow, someday pay off. "It’s immoral to rob from our children and grandchildren."
But there’s another aspect to earmarks that is equally troubling from a moral perspective: corruption. "The American people know that earmarks are the gateway drug to overspending," Coburn said. "But they also know that earmarks are what creates the problem in terms of ethics."
Coburn has warned senators that he will place a hold on any bill that violates any of several specific standards, including fiscal responsibility and constitutionality: "I’ve communicated, and I’m going to continue to communicate: If you’ve got an earmark in a bill, I’m going to make you defend it on the floor."
‘You can lead’
Not surprisingly, given his willingness to challenge the status quo, Coburn sometimes hears from supporters who are disappointed that he has chosen to term-limit himself in the Senate, just as he did in the House.
One such occasion was a luncheon for conservative women in Washington, where Coburn had already received a rousing ovation for his remarks and fielded numerous questions in a manner that clearly impressed his audience. Then a young woman in the crowd stood up and lamented that the senator’s term-limits pledge meant that he wouldn’t be able to put in the years necessary to rise into the ranks of leadership through the seniority system. Coburn’s reply aptly summarizes the life and mission of this Muskogee physician: "I guess there are two ways to look at leadership: You can hold the position. Or, you can lead."
For More Information
Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., encourages anyone who wants to hold the federal government accountable to visit the Federal Financial Management subcommittee website: http://coburn. senate.gov/ffm/. The site offers investigative articles and news stories on wasteful federal spending.
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