Serious budget cutting? The House has other fish to fry.
By Dana Milbank
WashPost
Sunday, February 20, 2011
To say that our lawmakers are carping at trifles gives them too much credit. In fact, they are carping at carp.
"Asian carp [are] one of the world's most rampant invasive species," Rep. Dave Camp (R-Mich.), chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, proclaimed on the House floor, 35 hours into the debate over budget cuts. "Weighing up to 100 pounds, spanning over six feet and eating half their body weight daily, Asian carp have the ability to decimate fish populations indigenous to the Great Lakes."
That certainly stinks for Great Lakes fish and Great Lakes fishermen. But if you think the federal budget will be balanced on the backs of the Asian carp, you're all wet. And that's what makes Camp's carping emblematic of the current debate over budget cuts. The whole exercise is less about improving the nation's fiscal balance than about parochial concerns and political volleys.
Camp continued: "These giant bottom feeders" - he was talking about the fish, not his colleagues - "would destroy the region's $7.5 billion fishing industry." His solution: Have the feds close the locks that separate the Illinois River from Lake Michigan.
(More here.)
WashPost
Sunday, February 20, 2011
To say that our lawmakers are carping at trifles gives them too much credit. In fact, they are carping at carp.
"Asian carp [are] one of the world's most rampant invasive species," Rep. Dave Camp (R-Mich.), chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, proclaimed on the House floor, 35 hours into the debate over budget cuts. "Weighing up to 100 pounds, spanning over six feet and eating half their body weight daily, Asian carp have the ability to decimate fish populations indigenous to the Great Lakes."
That certainly stinks for Great Lakes fish and Great Lakes fishermen. But if you think the federal budget will be balanced on the backs of the Asian carp, you're all wet. And that's what makes Camp's carping emblematic of the current debate over budget cuts. The whole exercise is less about improving the nation's fiscal balance than about parochial concerns and political volleys.
Camp continued: "These giant bottom feeders" - he was talking about the fish, not his colleagues - "would destroy the region's $7.5 billion fishing industry." His solution: Have the feds close the locks that separate the Illinois River from Lake Michigan.
(More here.)
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