You know how ridiculous it would sound if a woman said she was only a “little bit pregnant?” Well Sen. Nodler’s convenient definition of earmarks is about on par with that statement. SNL reporter Chad livengood had a good Sunday piece on what the Senator considers earmarks:

Republican congressional candidate Gary Nodler says a special funding request for a pet project — in both Jefferson City and Washington — can only be called an earmark if it is slipped into a bill after the committee process.

Nodler, who chairs the state Senate’s appropriations committee, explained his “definition of an earmark” to reporters on Thursday in defense of a $25 million “forgivable loan” he got this year for a Joplin battery maker.

Nodler added the $25 million for Eagle-Picher Corp. in his committee, days before the end of the legislative session.

“That was not an earmark,” Nodler told reporters after announcing his 2010 bid for the 7th Congressional District seat. Read more…

Excuse me if I don’t immediately take the time to wipe STUPID off my freakin’ forehead! Good grief, can he be serious???? This looks absolutely terrible. After two blow out elections, you would think that Republican politicians woould finally start to get it. WE ARE TIRED OF BUSINESS AS USUAL.

Related:

CDT: Bond advice aids budget for stimulus

In the final days of the Missouri legislative session, the telephone of state Sen. Gary Nodler was ringing off the hook.Nodler, a Republican from Joplin, is chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and he was getting an earful. Usually the appropriations chairman gets plenty of advice about how to spend the state’s money. But this year Nodler had at his disposal hundreds of millions of federal stimulus dollars approved by Congress to boost the sagging economy.

Among those calling Nodler with suggestions was U.S. Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., who voted against President Barack Obama’s $787.2 billion stimulus package in February. Two months later, days before the state budget deadline, Nodler hammered out a spending plan that included $50 million for two high-tech battery manufacturing plants in Missouri and $12 million for an air cargo facility at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport for trade with China.

Although the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Industry was lobbying for the China hub facility in St. Louis, there had been no testimony about it. Jason Van Eaton, who was formerly on Bond’s staff, lobbied for the Kokam project and is executive director of the China Hub Commission. During a visit to the University of Missouri last week, Bond downplayed his involvement in both projects. “I was just calling to find out what was going on,” he said. “I talk to a lot of my friends. We asked about a lot of things that were going on.”

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