This is a response to a Gannett News Service - Springfield Missouri News-Leader article quoting hometown Congressman Roy Blunt. Congressman Blunt has been one of the prime proponents of congressional pork since 1994. Chef à la maison Blunt, who until control passed to House Democrats recently has been a "prince of earmarks," made the following statement about the House Democratic funding bill passed on March 23rd. Only two Republicans voted for the bill that contains benchmarks and a time -certain withdrawal date from the occupation of Iraq.

"This is a bill that has all these command and control problems and $21.3 billion of non-Afghanistan, Iraq spending" including $50 million for a Capitol Hill power plant and $25 million for spinach farmers, .
Blunt said

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The faux "Christian" echo of Karl Rove and integral part of the Right Wing Noise Machine,
the Family "Research" Council,

similarly weighed in, in "Funding the War on Spinach."

"With debate underway on an emergency supplemental funding bill to supply our troops in Iraq, liberals in Congress have been merrily larding it up with a raft of pork projects designed to buy votes for the bill's real goal: setting a deadline for pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq next year."

"As a result, The Troop Readiness, Veterans' Health, and Iraq Accountability Act of 2007 is laden with measures like $25 million for spinach growers."

"Let's tell Congress to get its act together and focus on our troops
overseas. Their need for equipment and weapons is a real emergency - peanut storage and spinach subsidies aren't. Let's also tell our members of Congress that it's time to hop off the earmark gravy train and stop the explosion in pork barrel projects that has put the reputation of the U.S. House and Senate at new lows."

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It's incredibly ironic that Roy Blunt complained about the inclusion of $25 million for "spinach farmers" in the Iraq funding bill. The entire industry was devastated after contamination of a crop from a single farm.

The Iraq funding legislation would set an eventual limit on the war and occupation that has already claimed the lives of over 650,000 Iraqis and almost 3,300 American military and has cost over half a trillion dollars.

To put this in better context, Blunt slipped special interest language for tobacco giant Altria into the Homeland Security funding bill just preceding Iraq's invasion. On 11/13/02, the day Blunt was named House majority whip, only hours before House members voted on the bill creating the Department of Homeland Security, Blunt inserted language favoring Altria into the draft bill. It would have made it harder to sell tobacco products over the Internet and would have cracked down on the sale of contraband cigarettes. its presence was revealed, the corporate welfare was removed.

Altria executives made mammoth donations to Blunt between 10/18 and 10/28/02. Blunt's leadership PAC received 37 contributions totaling $30,900 from employees of Altria and its Philip Morris, Kraft Foods, and Miller Brewing units. Thirty-one contributions were received on 10/25/02, including the then-maximum $1,000 each from Altria lobbyists Lindsay Hooper, Walter Steward and Franklin Polk. Within a year the Blunt divorced his wife, and married a young Altria lobbyist. As of 2005, Blunt's political committees had received $270,000 from Altria.

Also in 2003, Blunt helped his UPS lobbyist son Andrew, by inserting a provision into the $79 billion emergency appropriation for the war in Iraq to benefit U.S. shippers such as United Parcel Service, Inc. and FedEx Corp. The provision required that military cargo be carried only by companies with no more than 25% foreign ownership. UPS and FedEx sought to block the expansion of a foreign-owned rival's U.S. operations. UPS and FedEx contributed at least $58,000 to Rep. Blunt between 2001 and 2005.

http://www.realitybasednation.com/blog-archives/2005/09/25-week/

Rep. Blunt delivered for convicted briber Jack Abramoff, too. In May 2003, Abramoff lobbyist Todd Boulanger drafted a letter to Interior Secretary Gale Norton warning that "we hold you accountable" to prevent "reservation shopping" by the Jena Choctaw Tribe of Louisiana. The Louisiana Coushatta tribe, an Abramoff client, was fighting the Interior Department's recognition of the Jena because they would provide competition for the Coushattas' casinos.

A version of Boulanger's letter signed by Blunt and now-indicted House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) was delivered to Norton that June. Blunt signed two other letters to Norton opposing the Jena Choctaw's efforts to open a casino. http://www.cleanupwashington.org/hos/page.cfm?pageid=61
Last week, Norton's chief deputy pleaded guilty to felonies for repeatedly lying to Congress about his relationship with Abramoff.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-03-23-interior-abramoff_N.htm

(s) Frank Smith
Bluff City, KS