Josh Marshall has an interesting post, really a series of posts, on Sarah Palin's aggressive pursuit of earmarks both as mayor and as governor. Particularly now that there is a paradigmatic case with the Seal DNA research study.
The hypocrisy of presenting herself as an anti-pork crusader while clearly having a record as a champion acquirer is Marshall's focus. But he also finds himself trying to answer a related but different question--are there some good things about the earmark process as it relates to serious research?
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Research and Pork
A number of you have written in (mainly research scientists of one sort or another) to say that in the case of Sarah Palin's $3.2 million earmark request to study seal DNA we should not jump to the conclusion that such spending is wasteful just because it may sound funny. So let me be clear. I don't assume that at all. In fact, I'm a big supporter of federal spending on pure research -- much of which McCain routinely derides as pork to guffaws all around. My father was a marine biologist whose commitment to investment in the sciences was so great that he'd surely send a thunderbolt down from heaven to smite me if I didn't. Of course, being such a hard core scientist he didn't believe in heaven, which is a complication. But I digress. I raise these earmarks because it is another example that John McCain and Sarah Palin are monumental hypocrites and liars on the whole issue of reform, earmarks, the Bridge to Nowhere and virtually everything else. So it would be irresponsible not to make that clear.
Late Update: TPM Reader LS makes a good additional point ...
One more point of view from a scientist:
good science is funded through peer review, not via earmarks and lobbying.
we don't want science funded this way, it leads to croneyism and misuse. give the money to NIH and NSF and don't do by congressman trading favors.
earmarks are lousy way to fund science, bad, bad, bad.
TPM Reader CM makes much the same point ...
I'm a social scientist, rather than a hard scientist, but, for better or for worse, I swim in the sea of research dollars. While I agree with your post that funding research is a good use of tax money and is essential to keeping our society and economy vital, I'm not sure that earmarking research dollars through legislative action is the best way to ensure that the best research is funded. The federal government has organizations like the National Science Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities that distribute research dollars after review by area experts and professional scientists. While I certainly do think congressional oversight of the NSF and the NEH is necessary, allocation of research funds is best left to the professionals. However valid, direct research funding through spending bills is a pork-related program activity.
As a related matter, most of Palin's 'science' earmarks requested for last year are actually sops to the fishing industry in her state to which she is closely tied.
--Josh Marshall
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