Word: pork-barrel
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...debating ... himself. He was against the Bush tax cuts before he was for them. He has now proposed a new and costly round of corporate tax breaks - and a summer gasoline-tax holiday that is just the sort of flummery he has traditionally opposed. McCain's insistence on cutting pork-barrel projects from the federal budget is worthy but not very significant - the narcissism of small deductions. He would be better served by announcing his intention to kill some of the more foolish Pentagon weapons systems, as he has in the past...
...Pakistani political system is based on an elected official's ability to deliver locally. "You will never see a candidate offer a five-point plan to solve the flour crisis because it's not really what the voter cares about," says a Western official, who calls politicking in Pakistan "pork-barrel politics to the nth degree." The whole system is built around largesse, favors and influence peddling, he says. Instead, politicians prefer to buy flour themselves and distribute it amongst the poor - a better way to earn personal loyalty and guarantee votes the next time around...
...weaknesses. He is a conviction politician, passionate about the issues that animate him, dismissive of and uninterested in those that don't. Iraq, foreign policy, the military and treatment of veterans - these topics get him excited. In the domestic realm, he's fire and energy when he rails against pork-barrel spending. But mention other issues - taxes, health care, education policy - and he briefly resorts to talking points before changing the subject. "Obviously, the economy is a very, very vital issue," he told me. "There's no doubt about that, O.K.? But the issue that's going to be with...
...stuff. His utter independence is bracing, and his willingness to say "I don't know" is honest, often to a fault. You could almost sense his audiences arguing with themselves at his town meetings: "What a great American! ... But does he really think Washington politicians are going to stop pork-barrel spending? And why is he so soft on those illegal immigrants...
...truth is, if homeland security money were truly distributed based on risk, there would be no guaranteed minimum at all. Guaranteed minimums are useful only for getting states up to speed - or for pork-barrel indulgences. At this point, all states have received enough money to set up a basic emergency infrastructure. So the rational thing to do would be to focus our limited resources on high-density, high-risk locations. But Congress is not rational. The Senate gives disproportionate power to small states, and those states do not want to lose their homeland-security entitlements. So the result...