During his State of the Union address last night, President Bush tried to create the impression that he cares about wasteful pork spending and wants to reduce it by a lot and right away: The people's trust in their government is undermined by congressional earmarks -- special interest projects that are often snuck in at the last minute, without discussion or debate. Last year, I asked you to voluntarily cut the number and cost of earmarks in half. I also asked you to stop slipping earmarks into committee reports that never even come to a vote. Unfortunately, neither goal was met. So this time, if you send me an appropriations bill that does not cut the number and cost of earmarks in half, I will send it back to you with my veto. And tomorrow, I will issue an executive order that directs federal agencies to ignore any future earmark that is not voted on by the Congress. Let's do some myth-busting about this. Two key assertions here cry out for correction and clarification: 1. Presidential Power Grab: the phrase suggesting "congressional earmarks" are a unique evil undermining people's trust in their government is deliberately misleading and self-serving. Both Congress and the President provide project-specific direction to appropriations. If the amount of earmark spending by the president is not in fact greater than the congressionally-requested amount, it is at least very close to it. Neither side can be expected to disarm unilaterally in what is really a bid by Bush to gain the upper hand in a struggle between the branches for earmark authority. 2. Cutting Earmarks Saves Zero Dollars: Bush's remarks -- and, frankly, those of many earmark reform advocates -- imply that eliminating earmarks would save taxpayer dollars. It's not true. It wouldn't save a penny. Money that is not earmarked by Congress or the President will be spent anyway, as federal agencies see fit. In the end, every dollar spent is earmarked for something. This point is lost on many people: earmark reform is not a fiscal issue -- cutting earmarks out entirely would not reduce spending by a single penny. The foregoing does not mean that earmark reform is not needed. Citizens should know more about how and where their government's money is spent. More debate is necessary on what pork is and how to limit narrow special interest breaks and bennies. But no one should be under any illusion about what eliminating "congressional earmarks" would or would not accomplish, and who would benefit or suffer as a result.