Tonight on Bill Moyers...earmarks and how they work

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http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/blog/2008/02/ask_the_reporter_and_producer.html

"Ask the Reporter and Producer: Exposé on Bill Moyers Journal

This week BILL MOYERS JOURNAL and the PBS series EXPOSÉ: AMERICA'S INVESTIGATIVE REPORTS offer a hard and fresh look at how earmarks really work. The broadcast profiles SEATTLE TIMES reporters on the trail of how members of Congress have awarded federal dollars for questionable purposes to companies in local Congressional districts—often to companies whose executives, employees or PACs have made campaign contributions to the legislators. The segment also focuses on how earmarks for some products were added to the defense appropriations bill even in cases in which the military didn’t want them in the first place. Example: a $4.65 million patrol boat the Coast Guard hadn’t even asked for and decided it couldn’t use was eventually given away by the Coast Guard to a California Sheriff’s office. David Heath of the SEATTLE TIMES says: “They're selling a product to the military that they're not even using.”


http://www.pbs.org/wnet/expose/

"Watch a preview of the show, find out more from EXPOSÉ online and also check out THE SEATTLE TIMES online database of earmarks, The Favor Factory."

Welcome to a new season of Exposé: America's Investigative Reports, the documentary series that spotlights some of the most important investigative journalism in America. Each month a new show will premiere on this site and air on PBS's Bill Moyers Journal.

In our season premiere, Seattle Times reporters take a close look at pork barrel politics..."



http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/favorfactory/

"Congressional Earmarks
A database of lawmakers, earmarks, and campaign giving.

How to use this database..."

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1. Thanks for the R's, kicking this back up for tonight and also

for the database put together by the reporters at the Seattle Times.

Page for Clinton
http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/favorfactory/lawmaker.php?id=S0NY00188

Page for Obama
http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/favorfactory/lawmaker.php?id=S4IL00180

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2. Starting now 9:00 ET n/t

[L. Coyote]

3. kicking as a reminder

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4. Thanks :) n/t

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5. on the hour kick

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6. west coast reminder kick

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7. Good Show. REC REC

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11. Thanks again for the kicks :) n/t

[Andy823]

8. It was excellent

I think everyone shoudl watch this show, and they also have links on their site where you can get more info on all those in congress who are wasting taxpayer dollars on these earmarks. I live in Washington state, so I was very intrested in what congress woman Murray has been doing, and I am not happy at all!

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10. Both segments were excellent, thanks for the kick. n/t

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9. Links to both segments...earmarks & Afghanistan

Full show transcript...
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/02222008/transcript3.html


Policies for the "Forgotten War"

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/blog/2008/02/policies_for_the_forgotten_war_1.html

"Conversing with Bill Moyers on this week’s JOURNAL, former NPR journalist Sarah Chayes discussed many of the complex challenges on the ground in Afghanistan, including what she suggests is a fundamental contradiction in American strategy:

“We’re paying a billion dollars a year to Pakistan, which is orchestrating the Taliban insurgency. So it’s actually U.S. taxpayer money that is paying for the insurgents, who are then killing – at the moment – Canadian troops... It’s been very clear to me, watching since 2002, that Pakistan has been buying us off by a well-timed delivery of an al-Qaeda operative, which has then caused us to look the other way about the Taliban... so this is why 99 % of the people in Kandahar believe that we are allied with the Taliban. Everybody thinks that America is allied with the Taliban.”



"Ask the Reporter and Producer: Exposé on Bill Moyers Journal

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/blog/2008/02/ask_the_reporter_and_producer.html

"This week BILL MOYERS JOURNAL and the PBS series EXPOSÉ: AMERICA'S INVESTIGATIVE REPORTS offer a hard and fresh look at how earmarks really work. The broadcast profiles SEATTLE TIMES reporters on the trail of how members of Congress have awarded federal dollars for questionable purposes to companies in local Congressional districts—often to companies whose executives, employees or PACs have made campaign contributions to the legislators. The segment also focuses on how earmarks for some products were added to the defense appropriations bill even in cases in which the military didn’t want them in the first place. Example: a $4.65 million patrol boat the Coast Guard hadn’t even asked for and decided it couldn’t use was eventually given away by the Coast Guard to a California Sheriff’s office. David Heath of the SEATTLE TIMES says: “They're selling a product to the military that they're not even using.”

Watch a preview of the show, find out more from EXPOSÉ online and also check out THE SEATTLE TIMES online database of earmarks, The Favor Factory."