Editorial: Smoke 'em out
Cleveland Plain Dealer
August 25, 2006
The Senate, that most decorous of institu tions, goes to great lengths to protect the whims of its members. Too great, in some instances: If a senator wishes that a bill not come to the floor, all he or she need do is express that desire to the floor leader, and the matter may never see the light of open debate.
The process is called a "hold," a frivolous nicety that now threatens a bill that would make it easy for Americans to see just how Congress spends the unimaginable sums of money -- $2.5 trillion last year -- that keep the federal government operating.
The Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006, co-sponsored by conservative Republican Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and liberal Democrat Barack Obama of Illinois, would create a single, stand-alone, searchable database Web site free to anyone wishing to know where, through whose hands and to whom the money goes.
Partisans across the spectrum like it. Its 27 co-sponsors include the majority and minority leaders as well as both parties' potential presidential candidates (and Ohio Sens. Mike DeWine and George Voinovich).
But somebody in that 100-member club doesn't want the people to easily determine where that money flows. We don't know who -- the hold is done in the secrecy that befits only someone with something to hide. Nor do we know why. Perhaps, we might speculate, if the recipients of certain earmarked spending were easily determined, people outside the Upper Chamber might ask, well, rude questions of those who mandated the largesse.
But this we do know: This hold must not be allowed to stand. It is not an ironbound right. The Majority Leader, Bill Frist of Tennessee, has the option of bringing the measure anyway. The worst that can happen is the reticent senator, flushed out of his or her lair, must then mount a public filibuster. It's time for Frist to assert his leadership prerogative. It's our money. Smoke 'em out.
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