Club for Growth has a post today on their blog about Brian Bilbray’s about face on the issue on congressional earmarks. They point out what he said in the campaign and his FOUR votes againt ammendments proposed to curtail congressional pork. See post here.
One of the reasons CRA opposed Bilbray in the primary was his past history as a congressman. Despite the many assurances that things would change they didn’t. Business as usual
Bilbray wasn’t alone in continuing these congressional practices. Only Dan Lungren voted for a couple of the ammendments. The rest of the GOP delegation voted four times to protect secret earmarks and pork spending projects. Then they all voted for a bill that had 1500 earmarks.
When Democrats were in power, the GOP stood as the check on uncontrolled wasteful spending. But who will check the GOP???
June 15th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Well, I guess no one can say the CRA (and The Flashman) didn’t warn us.
June 16th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Tony, I guess your theory about Brian BillThomas conforming to his district has been proven wrong. In fact I doubt his old district or the new one would want a congressman who would vote for this…unless the earmarks were coming to them.
June 16th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Gentlemen:
The vote on this Bill was an overwhelming 406 “no”, to just 22 “Yes”.
So why single-out Brian Bilbray for abuse?
Dana Rohrabacher, David Dreier, Duncan Hunter, George Radanovich all
voted the same way Bilbray did.
So why no criticism of DEMOCRATS who also voted No, like Nancy
Pelosi, Adam Schiff, Howard Berman, etc? Why be exclusively a
Hair Shirt for Republicans?
So why single out Brian Bilbray for abuse?
June 16th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Correction… passage of the bill came on a vote
of 406 “YES” to 22 “No”.
June 16th, 2006 at 12:00 am
It might also be noteworthy to mention that Congressman Bilbray voted in support of the Amendment Number 1 offered by Congressman Hefley that would have reduce the appropriations included in the bill by $678,000,000 – it failed 87-340. The “earmarks” in this bill represent less than 1% of the actual appropriations.
June 16th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Rep. Bilbray joined Reps. Campbell, Herger Hunter, Issa, Lungren, Rohrabacher and Royce in supporting the Hefley Amendment.
Hefley offers this amendment on most spending bills and it is considered a major “budget hawk” vote.
June 16th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Dale and Kurt:
Thank you for the additional, helpful information.
Bilbray also joined other California GOP House
members today in passing a resolution backing
the War on Terror, 256-153. (Roll Call 288)
June 16th, 2006 at 12:00 am
I think Mike made it clear in his post that the entire GOP delegration voted for a bill that had 1500 earmarks!!! Bilbray is only being singled out because he is the most recently elected…I expected as much from him so I am not surprised in the least. It was said that the earmarks equate to less than 1%. But that is less than 1% of how many billions and billions (Sagan voice impersonated).
The point is, this is one reason among many that fiscal conservatives are becoming increasingly disenchanted with the GOP. Absolute power has corrupted our members of congress absolutely.
I recently received an industry publications regarding transportation funding in California. It stated there was 750 million devoted to improving our California freeways and 1 billion for Route 99. I know a lot of staunch Republicans who sit in traffic everyday who would be swayed to vote against our Republican incumbents if this fact was drilled in during drivetime radio in LA.
I consider myself a social & fiscal conservative. But I would rather the congress (sure, with Bilbray leading the charge) focused on reducing spending, starting with all the pork, than be pitching a marriage bill right now…they are insulting me by trying to convince me how conservative they are while they waste my money.
I am glad to hear about the positive votes Bilbray has had thus far….but remember that just because he votes better than others in the Cal-GOP delegation doesn’t mean squat because many of them have been maxing out our national credit card for years.
June 16th, 2006 at 12:00 am
I appreciate the fact that Dwight read my actual post before posting. While the staffers apologize and pretend that our esteemed California GOP Congressmen are protecting us from big government spending, the COMPLETE voting record shows us they are not.
June 17th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Mr. Spence:
I’ve followed Mr. Bilbray’s career here in San Diego for almost 30 years: from
lifeguard, to Imperial Beach councilman and Mayor,then ousting an incumbent
Democratic County Supervisor in 1984, toppling an incumbent Democrat mem-
ber of Congress in 1994, defeating Christine Kehoe in 1998, and now returning
to Congress.
During those years he has consistently been a moderate-conservative and has
been well-liked and respected by nearly all local GOP and conservative activists
in San Diego.
So, please, tell me what I have missed in the past 3 decades… what is this
‘COMPLETE’ voting record that shows Brian Bilbray is a bad guy?
June 17th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Mike — There was no apology in my comment. Just information on a vote conveniently left out of the Club for Growth post, on which you based your comments.
June 17th, 2006 at 12:00 am
James–Please read the orginal post and the Club for Growth blog that has links to the orginal votes.
Dale’s right, The GOP Congressmen from California are not apologetic. That was my mistake. They think they did nothing wrong.
June 18th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Dwight/Mike,
You’ve both hit the national GOP’s problem squarely on the nose. And Dwight … I’ve been wrong before, and I’ll be wrong again! I’m sorry to say Bilbray hasn’t surprised me either. I’d hoped for better, but didn’t expect it.