John McCain on Government Reform
April 17th, 2008 at 02:18pm Mark Noonan
There is a lot of good in McCain’s plan to reform our government:
John McCain Will Stop Earmarks, Pork-Barrel Spending, And Waste. He will veto every pork-laden spending bill and make their authors famous. As President, he will seek the line-item veto to reduce waste and eliminate earmarks that have led to corruption. Unlike Senators Clinton and Obama who have sought a nearly combined $3 billion in earmarks, John McCain has a clear record of not asking for earmarks. Earmarks restrict America’s ability to address genuine national priorities and interfere with fair, competitive markets.
John McCain Proposes A One-Year Spending Pause To Evaluate Programs. He believes that outside of essential military and veterans programs there should be a one-year pause in discretionary spending growth that should be used for a top-to-bottom review of the effectiveness of federal programs.
John McCain Has The Leadership And Courage To Make The Right Spending Choices. Reduced spending means making choices. John McCain will not leave office without balancing the federal budget. He will not do it with smoke and mirrors. When he leaves office, he wants to leave a budget that stays balanced after he is gone, and can weather the occasional downturn and unexpected contingency. John McCain will provide the courageous leadership necessary to control spending, including:
Eliminate Broken Government Programs. The federal government itself admits that one in five programs do not perform.
Reform Our Civil Service System To Promote Accountability And Good Performance In Our Federal Workforce.
Eliminating Earmarks, Wasteful Subsidies And Pork-Barrel Spending.
Reform Procurement Programs And Cut Wasteful Spending In Defense And Non-Defense Programs.
There is more to McCain’s plan, but what I’ve quote here is, all by itself, a very ambitious agenda - and one which will make a difference. While Obama and Hillary talk of change, they really don’t propose any change other than changing money in your wallet into money in the Treasury. Obama and Hillary are too beholden to the largest and most powerful special interest group in the country - something which makes Big Oil, Big Pharmacutical and Big Tobacco, combined, look like pikers: Big Government. Most people don’t think too often about it, but the millions of government employees have money to spend, lots of free time and a vested interest in keeping government growing. Working through their union - Association of Federal, State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) - they bring vast amounts of campaign cash, vast numbers of volunteers and vast numbers of votes to the political table - and their influence on the Democratic party is second only to the pro-abortion lobby. There is no way that Obama or Hillary will cross this group, and thus all their talk of “change” will amount to nothing more than yet another round of liberal Democrat tax-and-spend.
Given that McCain won’t get the time of day from AFSCME - let alone any campaign help - there is no reason he will care at all what they think about his plans…and, so, when McCain says that he wants a full review of government programs with a mind towards elminating those which don’t work, we can rely on it that he means it…and the AFSCME people are probably shaking with fear over it. But, it does need to be done - over the decades, mounds of flapdoodle have been piled on to our government, and no one really knows where all the money goes, or what it is going for…a one year freeze for an audit will be a useful means of figuring out what has to go, and I’ll bet the money savings will be in the tens of billions of dollars, at the least.
All conservatives have at least some problem with McCain - some on immigration, some on CFR, some on this, that or the other thing…but all conservatives are united in the need for serious reform of government, and while McCain will not be able to slay the beast of Big Government, his genuine zeal for accountability and honesty will do wonders towards fixing the governmental mess.
Entry Filed under: Campaign 2008, Republicans
31 Comments
1. John McCain News » &hellip | April 17th, 2008 at 2:46 pm
[...] Read the rest of this great post here [...]
2. Todays Current Events in &hellip | April 17th, 2008 at 2:52 pm
[...] John McCain on Government Reform By Mark Noonan John McCain Will Stop Earmarks, Pork-Barrel Spending, And Waste. He will veto every pork-laden spending bill and make their authors famous. As President, he will seek the line-item veto to reduce waste and eliminate earmarks that have … Blogs For Victory - http://blogsforvictory.com [...]
3. Diana Powe | April 17th, 2008 at 3:56 pm
Well, it didn’t take time to figure out that Senator “Straight Talk” McCain is, in case anyone had failed to notice, a consummate Beltway insider regardless of claims on his website:
4. Sunny | April 17th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
I completely agree with putting a stop to all but the necessary spending for a least a year and eliminating the waste in our govenment. I think everyone is sick and tired of pork and both parties have been guilty of this. The biggest pork spender this past year was a Republican - and shame on him. It is time to have a fiscially responsible president. I do hope this includes no bid contracts. There has been unbelievable waste with these contracts during the Bush administration.
5. Joe | April 17th, 2008 at 4:34 pm
John McCain Has The Leadership And Courage To Make The Right Spending Choices. Reduced spending means making choices. John McCain will not leave office without balancing the federal budget. He will not do it with smoke and mirrors. When he leaves office, he wants to leave a budget that stays balanced after he is gone, and can weather the occasional downturn and unexpected contingency. John McCain will provide the courageous leadership necessary to control spending
How come when a Democrat makes a statement like this you all scoff at it. This statement about McCain isn’t anything more than words, so why is this so much better than a Dem saying it?
Come on now. Just come out and say McCain is better because he is not a Democrat. Don’t waste all our times saying how this is that much better than others.
6. Joe | April 17th, 2008 at 4:38 pm
Eliminate Broken Government Programs. The federal government itself admits that one in five programs do not perform.
Reform Our Civil Service System To Promote Accountability And Good Performance In Our Federal Workforce.
Eliminating Earmarks, Wasteful Subsidies And Pork-Barrel Spending.
Reform Procurement Programs And Cut Wasteful Spending In Defense And Non-Defense Programs.
Blah blah blah….. apparently he is nothing more than an “empty suit”. All these words that he is going to fix everything, but no real details behind anything.
7. Diana Powe | April 17th, 2008 at 4:49 pm
Maybe Senator McCain would like to go after wasteful boondoggles like this that are driven by the GOP’s faith-based belief (not to mention political contributions) that private industry is always better than government:
8. bongoman | April 17th, 2008 at 5:13 pm
Deleted - off topic.
9. Concerned Citizen | April 17th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Diana,
Let me first state that I am agianst most forms of earmark or pork barrel spending and think that this is one of the areas that should be gutted from our government along with the power of the lobby be it from big business or from some rights organization or another.
However, John McCain stated when this bill was on the floor a couple of years ago that the only reason he agreed to sponsor the memorial of Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist is because he had been an extremely influential Justice of the Federal Supreme Court and therefore it was justifiable to use Federal funds to honor him.
10. BARRASSO | April 17th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Duuuuuuuuhhhhhhh, George said he was conservative and I believed him, so McSame says he is conservative I will believe him to. No matter how much reality kicks me in the face I will continue to listen to what they say not notice what they do. I am a republican thinker.
11. Magnum Serpentine | April 17th, 2008 at 5:33 pm
Lets see…
john bush says that we can cut spending for children even freeze spending for children for a year, and yet john bush wants to fund the war with a blank check and of course john bush does not want to end the war which would save several hundred billion a year in our out of control george budget.
yeal right john, if you were serious about controlling the budget, you would reduce the military also and you would freeze military spending for a year.
12. Lifelike | April 17th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
“but all conservatives are united in the need for serious reform of government, ”
From what, eight years of conservatism, six of which Republicans controlled all four branches of government; delusional, simply delusional?
13. Percy Beezer | April 17th, 2008 at 6:07 pm
There are three branches of government, republicans controlled two of those for four years, not six, and that’s 4 out of 40.
Gads, liberals are an ignorant lot.
14. Maxine | April 17th, 2008 at 6:31 pm
In January 2008 Sen. John McCain attempted to argue that if elected president, he will eliminate “wasteful spending.” As evidence, he claimed that he has never asked for an earmark for his state of Arizona:
“And I’m proud to tell you, Chris, in 24 years as a member of Congress, I have never asked for nor received a single earmark or pork barrel project for my state and I guarantee you I’ll veto those bills. I’ll ask for the line item veto and I’ll veto them and I’ll make the authors of them famous.”
In 2006, the senator teamed up with fellow Arizona senator Jon Kyl (R) to funnel $10 million toward the University of Arizona for an academic center named after the late Supreme Court Justice William Rehnquist. Even Arizona lawmaker, Rep. Jeff Flake (R), said he was planning to “lean against the measure.” The National Taxpayers Union, another traditional McCain ally, questioned why the senator was making federal taxpayers foot the bill for the center.
In 2003, McCain also slipped $14.3 million into a defense appropriations bill to
create a buffer zone around Luke Air Force Base in Arizona. As reported in 2003, this project violated McCain’s own anti-pork rhetoric:
The only problem is the project to acquire more land near the base was not requested by President Bush or fully authorized by the Senate Armed Services Committee - two of McCain’s criteria for identifying so-called ‘pork.
Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK), a notorious porker, was overjoyed that McCain had joined his side. “One man’s pork is another man’s alternate white meat,” said Stevens. “If he asked for it, we put it in
15. Percy Beezer | April 17th, 2008 at 6:40 pm
Ignorant and gullible!
16. OperationChaos | April 17th, 2008 at 6:47 pm
There has been unbelievable waste with these contracts during the Bush administration.
I’m sure, Sunny, if you did some research, you’d find that the same happened under Slick’s administration.
But you won’t; you’re a partisan hackette with a hate-Bush agenda. You’re lazy. But then again, you’re a LIbEral, and most of you are lazy.
You’re also a cow…
17. kimberly4victory | April 17th, 2008 at 7:51 pm
Percy: Excellent catch … twice!!
18. Plantation Owner | April 17th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
I know John McCain will be in a better position and understanding to answer the following questions that the two Socialists are:
1) What is the maximum amount of a person’s income anyone should ever have to pay to the federal government in income taxes?
2) What percentage of total individual income is earned by the top one percent of income earners?
3) Do you think the top one percent of income earners are paying their fair share of income taxes?
4) What percentage of total income taxes collected by the federal government is paid by the top one percent of income earners?
5) What does the 10th Amendment to the Constitution say?
6) Do you think the 10th Amendment is obsolete?
7) Identify one government program where you believe government spending could be decreased.
Identify one government program you believe could be eliminated.
9) Should control of the education be returned to the local level?
Maybe they were asked the fluff questions at the recent debate simply because their constituents are incapable of understanding both the questions and answers!
“Democrat” was once used as a derogatory term that meant - “those who cater to the ignorant masses.”
In this case, that would 100% correct! The daily talking points that are spoon fed to their constituency makes it obvious!!!!
19. js | April 17th, 2008 at 11:33 pm
maybe they should give government employees incentive to save tax dollars
for example, if someone would point out how they could save 40k per year, they should prorate it over a 12 month period and give that employee a percentage of the savings over that first year…..maybe 2-3% of the total…percentages inspire though, how about if someone figured out how to save uncle sam 25 million per year? thats alot of incentive….
20. Fredrick Schwartz | April 17th, 2008 at 11:58 pm
Deleted - insults, commenter to be banned.
21. neocon | April 18th, 2008 at 12:30 am
Frederick,
You’re going to make him cry? You’re doing it wrong if you make him cry.
Just saying.
22. Lifelike | April 18th, 2008 at 7:33 am
13. Percy Beezer | April 17th, 2008 at 6:07 pm
Good catch on the fact conservatives had four years of total control of the government in which to get us into this financial mess. The fourth branch of government the conservatives own is the Supreme Court. You do recall that equal branch of government that ignored the people’s voice and brought the conservatives to power in the first place.
23. js | April 18th, 2008 at 9:09 am
in light of 9-11, we ended up spending a lot of money…thats true…and honestly, the SC really should be conservative….liberal experiments in criminal justice just doesnt really sound too appealing…nor is it possible for one singe supreme court judge to change the fact that homosexual conduct is sexually deviant behavior, or that abortion is still murder, no matter how you slice it…..reality is our economy is affected by acts of government for years down the road, policies implemented in the Clinton Administration show results in the Bush Administration, and the policies implemented today can have effects in 10-20 years…..
the demonuts ran on an anti corruption platform, they got control of congess and the senate based on a lie to the american people….running a serious anti corruption program is something they can not actually use this trip, and thats whats going to help make them lose in this election….
24. Joe | April 18th, 2008 at 10:27 am
nor is it possible for one singe supreme court judge to change the fact that homosexual conduct is sexually deviant behavior
— Other than just saying it is deviant, how exactly does it hurt you? Why are you not equally opposed to drinking alcohol? That has more potential to hurt you than two guys holding hands in public or doing whatever they want to in their own home.
policies implemented in the Clinton Administration show results in the Bush Administration, and the policies implemented today can have effects in 10-20 years
Oh man…. we are screwed for the next 10-20 years!!!!!
25. Percy Beezer | April 18th, 2008 at 2:04 pm
The judiciary is the third branch of the government; you’re not that stupid are you?
26. Sunny | April 18th, 2008 at 2:46 pm
16. OperationChaos | April 17th, 2008 at 6:47 pm
There has been unbelievable waste with these contracts during the Bush administration.
I’m sure, Sunny, if you did some research, you’d find that the same happened under Slick’s administration.
Actually, you need to prove your statement OperationChaos. I don’t believe there is much doubt that there has been unprecedented waste with the no bid contracts (and even some of the bid contracts) since the start of the Iraqi war. Apparently you don’t mind that billions and billions of our tax payers dollars have been wasted as long as it was wasted by a Republican administration.
27. Sunny | April 18th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
Percy Beezer | April 18th, 2008 at 2:04 pm
the fourth branch of government the conservatives own is the Supreme Court.
The judiciary is the third branch of the government; you’re not that stupid are you?
Percy, apparently you have forgotten. The Vice President’s office is a separate branch of our government. Now who looks stupid???
28. Joe | April 18th, 2008 at 3:02 pm
Sunny… only in the current Administration. :)
29. Joe | April 18th, 2008 at 3:03 pm
Actually, you need to prove your statement OperationChaos
Don’t hold your breath. Keefer never has to prove anything. He just lobs these things out as fact. Of course he will never look it up.
30. Diana Powe | April 18th, 2008 at 3:05 pm
Sunny,
Well, actually, there’s really a question about the Vice-President’s Office. It’s similar to Schrödinger’s cat. Fortunately, we have Dr. Wilbur von Philbert to clarify it for us:
http://www.salon.com/comics/tomo/2007/07/09/tomo/
31. Retirement South Carolina&hellip | May 4th, 2008 at 8:36 am
Retirement South Carolina
It is a quite interesting post but quite difficult to understand for me -