... earmarks ?! In Gail Collins, the New York Times has a first-rate writer and thinker who brings a fresh perspective to her op-ed pieces and seems to approach issues without any ideological bent, axe to grind, or hobby horse to flog. Less of a luminary perhaps in that stable of regular columnists than a Kristol, Krugman, or Kristof but Collins has a secret weapon the others don't: humor. Particularly commendable is last weekend's entry, George Speaks, Badly, a critique of President Bush's speech last Friday to the Economic Club of New York. Now, this was supposed to be where the President goes into the heart of American capitalism to address the serious economic problems that -- that very same day -- would fell one of New York City's most venerable investment houses. The administration has done next to nothing since the talk of recession began about three months ago. The nation's capital and real estate markets had lost trillions of dollars of value. The spotlight was on him. So what did the President have to say? A lot of folks are waiting to see what Congress intends to do. One thing that's certain that Congress will do is waste some of your money. So I've challenged members of Congress to cut the number of, cost of earmarks in half. I issued an executive order that directs federal agencies to ignore any future earmark that is not voted on by the Congress. In other words, Congress has got this habit of just sticking these deals into bills without a vote -- no transparency, no light of day, they just put them in. And by the way, this executive order extends beyond my presidency, so the next President gets to make a decision as to whether or not that executive order stays in effect. As usual, Collins had les mots justes to say about Bush's remarks: ... this economic crisis has been going on for months, and all the president could come up with sounded as if it had been composed for a Rotary Club and then delivered by a guy who had never read it before.... Besides being incoherent, this is a perfect sign of an utterly phony speech. Earmarks are one of those easy-to-attack Congressional weaknesses, and in a perfect world, they would not exist. But they cost approximately two cents in the grand budgetary scheme of things. Saying you're going to fix the economy or balance the budget by cutting out earmarks is like saying you're going to end global warming by banning bathroom nightlights. Lights out. Next?