Letter: Earmarks cannot stand the light of day

Saturday, Feb. 17, 2007 | 7:16 a.m.

A Las Vegas Sun editorial from Feb. 14, on UNLV gorging itself on legislative earmarks (money inserted into appropriation bills at the last minute to ensure they won't be reviewed or debated for legitimacy), states that earmarks "are not intrinsically bad."

Let's face it, they are disguised as earmarks because they cannot stand the light of day. In 2006, the editorial states, UNLV "received about $37 million from earmarks, much of which went into its research budget." Thirty-seven million dollars is a lot of money on the Black Market Pork Scale. Since much of the earmarks went into research, it did not go to student instruction.

The editorial veers on to say that earmarks "have also helped professors develop expertise in areas important to Southern Nevada." Are we to believe that tenured professors are so genetically impaired that they are incapable of developing any areas of expertise without first greasing themselves with taxpayer-supplied fat?

You beautifully capped off this expose by lauding UNLV's vow to seek grants (taxpayer gifts with no expectation of return of payment or benefit). Then you unbelievably cheer, "That's the spirit." Let me ask, on behalf of all taxpayers everywhere, is there some legal way to stamp out this morally bankrupt "spirit?"

I envision a huge bloated hog, with UNLV branded on the flank, gorging itself at one end of the educational trough, with a faceless bureaucrat pouring earmarks and grants in the other end. This is the spirit? If UNLV cannot survive without these Black Market Funds, perhaps, in the interest of taxpayers everywhere, UNLV should be shut down and the buildings turned into low-cost housing.

Dale Robertson, Henderson