Debbie Stabenow Understands the Power of Words

and that is exactly why she wants to promote the trillion dollar pork fest that is our current economic stimulus package in "[...] more general language so it isn’t viewed as an earmark."

In other words, make it harder to pin the dollars down.

Sell it baby!

Congress must not make the mistake of defining the pork in precise terms that might make certain monies appear to be aimed a particular constituency, but rather in "general" language, so that it seems to be directed in ambiguity.

So the money that’s going to the Army Corp of Engineers for dredging and other waterways projects, includes language to help with rebuilding locks, but doesn’t specifically name the Soo locks that allows travel between Lake Superior and the lower Great Lakes.

Nice.

If we Michiganders can get the Buckeyes to believe this money is headed to Ohio, by the time they figure out its actual destination it will be too late for them to pull the plug. Of course, some nearly anonymous Senator in Ohio has probably already made or will soon make the same argument to another newspaper down south of our border.

When politicians feel a need to word their bills in a manner that intentionally obfuscates their intended purpose, the bill is a bad bill, if not in cause, at least in style. We deserve better from those that we honor with representing us in D.C., and our junior Senator ought to be ashamed of herself for promoting this slight of hand.

This bill should be described exactly for what it is, and then the constituents can decide if it is a trick piece of legislation designed to steal tax money from our grandchildren by way of pulling the wool over the eyes of gullible grandparents. Or not.

A trillion bucks ought to at least be worthy of some honest language.