Word: pork-barrel
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...That doesn't mean that Amtrak, a creature of pork-barrel politics, is the right entity to revive rail travel. Burdened by the conflicting missions of providing comprehensive nationwide service and making a profit, Amtrak has failed at both. Now many experts are concluding that Amtrak as we know it will probably have to be scrapped--perhaps to be replaced by semiprivatized, regional passenger-train networks...
...phone, ran errands and dusted Fukuda's shoes. He finally took his father's place in 1972, but the years with Fukuda were well spent. For an L.D.P. baron, Fukuda was famously incorruptible, and Koizumi watched his mentor lose power to factions of the party that had perfected pork-barrel politics. Koizumi today rants about the waste in government spending largely because he watched his enemies in the biggest L.D.P. faction shove fat contracts to construction bosses who delivered votes and campaign war chests in return...
...developed under Fukuda, himself a bright, squeaky-clean policy wonk who frequently took on the LDP's most powerful clique, headed by Kakuei Tanaka and filled with politicians with cozy ties to special interest groups like construction bosses, farmers and war veterans. This is the faction most dependent on pork-barrel politics, campaign war chests and the obtaining of government largesse and protectionism in exchange for votes. "Fukuda was insulated from all the pork-barreling, and that had an effect on Koizumi," says Naoki Tanaka. Under Fukuda's tutelage, the future Prime Minister came to understand?and loathe?the corrosive...
...predecessors' prescription for Japan's woes. They spent more than $1 trillion over the past decade trying to rev up the moribund economy; Koizumi has promised to end this profligate spending, starting with a 10% cut in next year's budget, and to shift funding from old-style, pork-barrel projects?building unnecessary roads, bridges, airports?to things like education, job training, information technology, environmental cleanup. At the same time, Koizumi wants to privatize, or destroy, state-owned companies and begin to sweep away the bad debts that burden Japan's tottering banks...
...GUARD Koizumi's biggest enemies are from within his own party, the Liberal Democrats. His reform agenda is designed to destroy the Establishment and their pork-barrel politics. They'll be chipping away at his plans every chance they get Koizumi's plan: Act the populist and use every attack against his agenda as a way to garner even more support. Cram through reforms before people realize just how bad things are Outlook: GOOD. They can make life difficult for Koizumi, but they don't offer any appealing alternative...