Earmark debate another example of Republican fiscal fraudulence

[stubtoe]

The Plum Line

"Conservatives target earmarks because, in isolation, they're often hard to defend, and they're an easy symbol of Washington greed to rail against... But they've managed to get into a heated argument among themselves over whether or not to cut a miniscule part of the federal budget. "

-snip-

"So Republicans have to keep pretending that what they intend to cut is stuff no one really wants, which leads to things like the spectacle of Jim DeMint endorsing Rep. Paul Ryan's austerity agenda while at the same time claiming entitlement cuts are off the table.

This is the major contradiction of the Republicans' recent victory. As Jonathan Cohn pointed out, Republicans ran on promises not to cut government-run health care for senior citizens. It's hard for them to now explain that what they really want to do is cut government-run health care for senior citizens. So, earmarks. "

[bulloney]

1. How much of the federal budget is earmarks? I think I've read it's minuscule.

Meanwhile, military spending continues to increase, funding obsolete or dysfunctional equipment that will never be used. Do we ever hear any cries to cut military spending? Instead, we come up with more excuses to increase it by making crap up about countries, invading them and occupying them indefinitely.