• An official at the Interior Department will plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge in connection with the Jack Abramoff investigation. Roger Stillwell was "the desk officer for the Mariana Islands at the U.S. Department of the Interior" and dealt often with Abramoff, who lobbied for the Islands. Stillwell is charged with "[f]ailing to report gifts from a 'prohibited source.'" I'll second Paul Kiel in saying that investigators are most likely starting with a small fish and working their way up. There is certainly a lot of dirt -- and a lot of lawmakers -- involved in the Marianas Islands angle in the web of Abramoff scandals. TPM Muckraker and Think Progress have more.
• Our buddies at Room 8 NY did some digging into the personal finances of Gary Ackerman (D-N.Y.) to find that his stock options in the defense contractor Xenonics have skyrocketed over the past four years as the U.S. has been engaged in two wars in Afghanistan and then Iraq. Ackerman purchased stock in Xenonics back in 2002 after the invasion of Afghanistan at a worth of $1,000-$15,000. That stock is now worth between $500,000 and $1,000,000! Since Ackerman's stock purchase and the invasion of Iraq Xenonics has received numerous contracts and multi-million dollar earmarks pushing their stock to higher and higher. Did Ackerman earmark these funds? Well, we don't know because there is no transparency in the process. Perhaps someone should ask.
• Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) makes his first foray into the blogging world at Porkbusters to assail Congress' use of earmarks and his own party's failure to live up to their ideal of limited government. The conservative blogosphere has picked up on McCain's post. Check out Instapundit, Freeman Hunt, Tim Chapman, and Ankle Biting Pundits. National Journal's Beltway Blogroll also has more.
  

This is shaping up to be earmark week in both Houses of Congress. Right now Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is decrying the earmarking practice on the Senate floor in the debate over the pork-laden emergency supplemental for Iraq and rebuilding after the twin Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The Christian Science Monitor and the New York Times both have articles about pork projects and earmarks today. In the CS Monitor Rep. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) says, "It's our only chance to maintain the majority. It really is," probably refering to a recent poll that shows that prohibiting members from "directing federal funds to specific projects benefiting only certain constituents," is one of the chief concerns of voters.

I've previously written about my misgivings about this poll. I believe this poll is similar to polls which show that the public believes that Congress is completely corrupt, but not their representative or Senator. A man in Nebraska interviewed in the New York Times makes my point for me, "I am critical of the fact that the federal government is worried about paying for parking garages — and for a million other things like that ... But they are. And if they are, I want my senator to be in there. I want Nebraska to compete." And it's not just residents who don't really mind the pork, the lawmakers like it too, and use it to sway votes. The National Journal's Stan Collender states that in the current era of narrow majority rule earmarks and pet projects are necessary to maintain control of your caucus:

In an era of narrow majorities in both houses, when a handful of votes can make the difference between legislative success and failure, earmarks are an even more important way of doing business in Congress today than they have been in the past. They are now a key tool to getting anything done and eliminating them will make it even harder to get majority support.

This points directly to one of the great fallacies of the current discussion about eliminating or limiting earmarks. In spite of all of the attention earmarks have received this year, there is not a great deal of support for doing anything about them. Just the opposite is true: most members of Congress don't want them limited and will fight hard to make sure it does not happen.

Very few of the players in the House and Senate stand to gain anything if the limits under discussion are adopted. The White House and leadership will reduce their ability to attract the additional votes they need to accomplish their legislative agendas. The appropriations committees will reduce their power because one of the few things they have to trade will be taken away. Individual members of Congress will find that their ability to deliver things for their constituents will be reduced substantially.

Certainly the leadership of both parties know this and are wary of those pushing to restrict the earmarking process. I think what would work best would be full transparency of earmarks followed by a peer-review process. Watching the current attempts by Sens. John McCain (R-AZ) and Tom Coburn (R-OK) attempt to strip earmark provisions out of the supplemental truly shows the merits of this process. Not only are these appropriations open to debate on the floor but the author must stand up and defend the appropriation. It is an ideal process for debating the merits and motives of a particuar line item. Perhaps with a little sunlight we wouldn't have members like Alan Mollohan (D-WV) and Pete Visclosky (D-IN) earmarking funds for campaign contributors, nor would we have jailed-Rep. Duke Cunningham's shady earmarks going without notice.

By a vote of 90-8 the Senate approved a lobbying reform bill that is being both praised and criticized from both sides of the aisle, according to the Washington Post. Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-CT) declares, “This legislation contains very serious reform.” One of the eight ‘nay’ voters, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), begged to differ, “It's extremely weak.” The most notable ‘nay’ votes came from the strongest proponents of reform: Senators Barack Obama (D-IL), Tom Coburn (R-OK), Russ Feingold (D-WI), and McCain. The other four votes came from James Inhofe (R-OK), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), John Kerry (D-MA), and Jim DeMint (R-SC). Roll Call reported that Obama, the Democratic point man on reform was very unhappy, “Given that Mr. Abramoff just got five years in the pokey, the notion that this is the best we can do doesn’t make any sense.” Sen. Chris Dodd, a chief sponsor of the bill, sounded triumphant proclaiming in the New York Times, “There's a sign that's now up in front of the Capitol. It says ‘Not for Sale.’” Later, he admitted that the bill does not include “true meaningful campaign finance reform that breaks the link between the legislative favor seekers and the free flow of special interest private money.” Coburn made the best analogy, “You can wash the outside of the cup all you want. If the inside is still unclean, you're going to have the same problems.”