Even without line-item veto, pork spending down

If the annual pork menu served up by Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John McCain, R-Ariz., is any indication, the line item veto may have fizzled as a device for making legislators less piggish.

Last year, the veto power was in place as the annual spending bills made their way through the system, leaving the president looking over appropriators' shoulders. This year, of course, the threat is gone, since the Supreme Court determined the line item veto wasn't so kosher.

Nevertheless, this year McCain's analysis of individual bills indicates that pork numbers are down. Last year, McCain, one of the Senate's chief line item veto sponsors, urged President Clinton to use the veto against a long list of earmarks and other slices of bacon he had identified in each of the bills. With no line item vetoes possible this year, McCain must be content with merely issuing long lists of such items.

Several of McCain's fiscal 1999 pork reports show earmarks decreasing from last year's levels of spending. For example, when the Senate passed its version of the VA-HUD spending bill, McCain identified $607 million in pork in the measure. Last year, he said, he found $642 million in "low-priority, unrequested, wasteful projects."

The same was true in the Senate version of the Interior spending bill. Last year, McCain identified $584.6 million in pork-barrel spending in the measure; this year, $351.8 million. Some of this could be due to Congress having less discretionary spending this year as a result of the 1997 balanced budget deal.

As in the past, McCain said the Military Construction bill is loaded with pork and since the bill has been signed, he was able to evaluate the conference report. This year's bill contains about 148 domestic projects that were not requested by the administration and were identified as low-priority. The total included 45 National Guard and reserve projects, as well as five control towers at Air Force bases that already have such towers.

The Energy and Water conference report also is loaded, McCain charged. When the bill left the Senate it contained more than $920 million in earmarks, McCain said, but when it returned from conference it was packed with $1.6 billion in pork.

As in the past, the Defense appropriations and authorization bills contained textbook cases. For example, McCain singled out an increase in purchases of C-130s, built in Marietta, Ga., from one to seven and funding for the LHD-8 amphibious assault ship constructed in Pascagoula, Miss.

House Appropriations Committee Chairman Bob Livingston, R-La., said he believes the line item veto never developed into an effective tool during the short time it was in place, and Clinton's use of it "made it less and less relevant." Livingston said the president created such a firestorm in how he used it on last year's Military Construction bill, that Clinton used it less and less. "It's not much of a tool in the first place," he said.

Although some levels of pork have dropped, McCain said he believes that appropriators have injected more pork into the system this year. "I sense that there's been some increases," he said, but not because the sword of the line item veto is no longer hanging over their heads. "People haven't been paying attention because of the scandal," he said, referring to Clinton's problems.

McCain said he plans to reintroduce a form of the line item veto next year to see if he can get it past both chambers and the Supreme Court.

"Gotta have some fun," he said.