Reform We Can Believe In

Methinks I smell a politically convenient exaggeration in Sarah Palin's reformer claims:

She also said in the News-Miner that she had slashed the state's earmark requests by nearly two-thirds, down from $550 million in 2007 to just under $200 million.

Palin's earmarks request came just days after President Bush promised in his State of the Union address to veto any spending bills from Congress unless lawmakers cut earmarks in half.

Yet documents Palin's office released to The Seattle Times on Tuesday show her cuts in earmarks were far more modest than she claimed. Last year, Palin requested $254 million in earmarks, not $550 million, so her cuts this year were only 22 percent, not the 63 percent she claimed.

Karen Rehfeld, Palin's Office of Management and Budget director, said she needed to look into the discrepancy between her boss's written remarks and the earmark tally provided by the staff. "We want to make sure we don't have a problem," Rehfeld said.

Now it's a little early in the morning and my math skills ain't so great anyway, but compared to what Obama requested in earmarks for Illinois -- estimated around $330M a year or so for a population 20 times greater than Alaska's -- Alaskans still received a shit load more per person that we did here in Illinois. Or anywhere, actually.

But reform, yeah... that's the ticket!