Jeffry Flake

Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Arizona's 6th district. You do not hear glowing praise of this man because he has made it his cause to expose earmarks. On a weekly basis Flake publicly decries foul after foul. These are examples of his weekly press releases.

Aug 30 - Flake, denounced a pork project contained in the Transportation-Treasury-HUD appropriations bill for fiscal year 2006.This week’s egregious earmark: $100,000 to Guntersville, Alabama for renovations to the Whole Backstage Theater.

“Earmarks played a leading role in Republicans’ ‘exit stage right’ from control of Congress last year,” said Flake.

Aug 24 - Flake, highlighted a pork project contained in the Transportation-Treasury-HUD appropriations bill for fiscal year 2006. This week’s egregious earmark: $3,200,000 to the University of Wisconsin - Marathon County for the construction of a building.

“It seems like Congress is running around in circles on earmark reform,” said Flake.

Aug 17 - Flake, highlighted a pork project contained in the Transportation-Treasury-HUD appropriations bill for fiscal year 2006. This week’s egregious earmark: $200,000 for the Museum of Aviation in Warner Robins, Georgia for expansion of the aviation flight and technology center.

“I think most taxpayers wish this earmark would crash and burn,” said Flake.

Aug 6 - Congressman Flake to Introduce Legislation Preventing States with Deficient Bridges from Receiving Wasteful Transportation Earmarks Earmarks Should Not Divert Funding From Bridge Inspection and Repair. Republican Congressman Jeff Flake, announced that he plans to introduce legislation that will prevent states with deficient bridges from receiving transportation earmarks that are not directly related to transportation, such as bike paths, transportation museums, parking lots, and road beautification projects. Many of the more than 6,000 earmarks in the most recent transportation bill went to such projects.

“It’s difficult to justify spending money on parking lots and road beautification projects when there are clearly more vital transportation needs,” said Flake.

Under the transportation bill passed in 2005, a state’s earmarks are subtracted from that state’s funding allocation, so every dollar spent on a bike path or transportation museum is a dollar the state cannot spend on more important transportation needs.

June 22 - Highlighted a project contained in the Transportation-Treasury-HUD appropriations bill for fiscal year 2006. This week’s egregious earmark: $500,000 for the Detroit Science Center to create a Space Science Discovery Lab.

“Congress is boldly going where no earmark has gone before,” said Flake.

• A space science center for Detroit? They have been looking for a football team since the 50's. Give the 500k to the Lions so they can afford a better general manager. Hell, give the money to the city for cleaning the damned bathrooms in the airport.
• This man, on domestic issues is about as true a Libertarian as possible. It is a courageous act to hold contemporaries up to scrutiny when the penalty will potentially be lack of support for his own district's needs if that need comes to pass. One thing is for sure, there will not be superfluous pork projects in the 6th district.