The true absurdity of the McCain/Palin "earmark reform" talking point was starkly revealed today. Both Palin and McCain were asked about Alaskan earmarks and their responses (if taken at face value) can only point in one direction -- in the words of Inigo Montoya:
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
In a clip released today from the Charlie Gibson interview, Sarah Palin doesn't deny that she supported the "bridge to nowhere". Instead she explains why she supported it:
GIBSON: But you were for it before you were against it. You were solidly for it for quite some period of time...
PALIN: I was...
GIBSON: ... until Congress pulled the plug.
PALIN: I was for infrastructure being built in the state. And it's not inappropriate for a mayor or for a governor to request and to work with their Congress and their congressmen, their congresswomen, to plug into the federal budget along with every other state a share of the federal budget for infrastructure.
GIBSON: Right.
PALIN: What I supported was the link between a community and its airport.
Wow. First of all, Palin undercuts her and McCain's entire "earmark reform" argument by stating that "it's not inappropriate for a mayor or for a governor to...plug into the federal budget." What exactly does she think an earmark is?
Then she goes on to try to justify her support for the "bridge to nowhere". It was about linking a community to its airport. Ok. Just so we understand, Sarah Palin is still coming up with reasons why the "bridge to nowhere" was a good thing for Congress to fund. Apparently she doesn't think it was one of those pesky earmark-things that she can't stop talking about.
So Charlie Gibson presses her on other Alaskan earmarks:
GIBSON: Governor, this year, requested $3.2 million for researching the genetics of harbor seals, money to study the mating habits of crabs. Isn't that exactly the kind of thing that John McCain is objecting to?
PALIN: Those requests, through our research divisions and fish and game and our wildlife departments and our universities, those research requests did come through that system, but wanting it to be in the light of day, not behind closed doors, with lobbyists making deals with Congress to stick things in there under the public radar. That's the abuse that we're going to stop. That's what John McCain has promised over and over for these years and that's what I'm joining him, also, saying, you're right, the abuse of earmarks, it's un-American, it's undemocratic, and it's not going to be accepted in a McCain-Palin administration. Earmark abuse will stop.
It appears that Sarah Palin's definition of "earmark abuse" is pretty damned narrow. Let's see. Studying the genetics of harbor seals in Alaska is not earmark abuse. But according to John McCain, studying the genetics of bears in Montana is earmark abuse.
But, oops, why did John McCain vote for the bear-DNA study that he cites as a prime example of earmark abuse?
Are things coming into focus? For McCain and Palin, "earmark reform" is an absolutely meaningless slogan. Something further reinforced by McCain's appearance on The View today:
BARBARA WALTERS: [Palin] took some earmarks...
MCCAIN: Not as governor, she didn't.
Oh well, then. McCain's vaunted "earmark reform" is becoming a very amorphous proposition. What the hell are these maverick reformers planning to reform? Nothing. More of the same.
"Bridge to Nowhere"? How about "Campaign to Nowhere".