What to look for in our next representatives

With the news that the US Senate voted yesterday to preserve its ability to earmark legislation (both Domenici and Bingaman voted to keep the pork coming), thus providing for often wasteful spending back home, often called “pork,” I thought my recent article from the Las Cruces Sun-News on how those running to represent New Mexico in Congress should approach the issue.
The underlying point of the piece is: “New Mexico should stand on its own two feet and not rely so much on the federal government.” Fortunately, because our representatives will have such limited pull due to their lack of seniority, our political leaders have no other choice at this point.
Making the Senate vote even more illustrative is the fact that on the very same day, the House passed a budget that — if its outlines are followed — would allow the vast majority of President Bush’s tax cuts to expire. Clearly, the collective voice of Congress is saying “Keep the pork flowing. We’ll raise your taxes to do it.” It is truly unfortunate that Senator Domenici decided to favor “bridges to nowhere” over New Mexico taxpayers.