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Show Federal waste is bi-partisan some degree, they mu'sa aiso oe held cupable for the economic mess everyone says our government is in today. I rather suspect the problem lies as well with us. Would we as citizens vote for a man who didn't put bacon on the pork barrel? Could part of the problem be that we want our own free lunch from the massive Federal cafeteria, and our representatives are merely reflecting that demand? I have some ideas about that, but that "file" can wait for another time. What I do know is that expenditures for tens of thousands of dollars (as one Utah Senator did last month) for just one entry in Congressional Record doesn't sound very frugal to me. And it smacks a bit of hypocrisy for these same "guardians of the Treasury" to sneak in through the back door and get away with millions of those same tax dollars. Though their campaign rhetoric would have us believe other wise, these Congressmen are not always angelically-pure defenders of the Federal dollar, and their liberal opponents are not always the Black Bart's, Finally, if every Senator and Congressman were to save in one year just what has come across my desk in the past week, the Federal Government would save $1.7 billion dollars per year. A good start? There, now.. I was glad to get that off my chest. I've had this little item filed in the back of my mind for a long time under "Things That Bug Me About Conservative Con-servative Congressmen" I feel I must finally get off my chest. Before doing so, I would like to submit the following disclaimer: 1-1 am politically moderate, 2-a Republican and 3-will probably vote for some of the same men I'm about to criticize. You can tell election time is approaching, ap-proaching, not because there's a nip in the air, but because we're all having dreams about how low our taxes will be once spending is cut as much as the candiditates say they will. . But as is the case with dreams, reality soon follows with a cold slap to the face-and the spending, and the taxes , and the deffecit continues to escalate. If it were those darned liberals ( causing the problems, it wouldn't be so bad. Besides, they got to Congress promising more and bigger government govern-ment programs. But the conservatives? The "friends of the oppressed taxpayer?" The man who rode assaults on high taxes, out-of-line spending and pork barrel projects into a Congressional seat? Sorry, but as far as I've seen, their help in the battle of the governmental bulge is mainly superficial. Sure, they're there on the floor fighting for good ol' conservative causes. Their press releases drip with venom towards their liberal adversaries. But their less publicized activities make them look an awful lot like their more liberal colleagues. For when it comes to getting grants for their states, or money for state projects, they're in their plugging away for every nickle they can. Through our offices come a constant stream of notices proudly announcing some money our Senators or representatives have managed to get for Utah. The amounts vary $45,000, $87,980, $235,500, $770,391, and they, over time, add up to a large amount. Some are for commendable and badly-needed badly-needed public works projects in the state. But others are oddly in areas you'll hear the same Senator or Representative Represen-tative assail as being worthless Federal bureaucracy and wasted money. Some I would even nominate for a Golden Fleece award. The point is this: Yes, conservative Senators do battle taxes on the floor, do attack high spending in speeches, but spend an awful lot less energy attacking at-tacking those "pork barrel" projects for the folks back home, unless, that is, they're someone else's project. So, to |