text: what is earmark used by congress?   earmarks are funds assigned to certain projects that are attached to a completely unrelated appropriations bill. say a bill is being passed that puts 25 more police on the streets in dc and say at the end of that bill there is a paragraph that says 1.5 billion dollars goes to the state of alaska to build a bridge that goes to a city with only 50 ppl in it. (true recent earmark btw)  when that bill passes, the earmark (funds) are approved.  earmarks increased from 1,300 in 1994 to 14,000 last year = $27 billion... so much for conservatives believing in small government and fiscal responsibility.  there are a few more facts worth noting: - earmarks are also used to buy votes on legislation. say a congressman is not wanting to approve a bill. they will approach that congressman and offer him x funds to be added to that bill as an earmark if he will vote for it. this happens a lot. - bush recently asked congress to give him line item veto power which would allow him to cross out specific earmarks only without vetoeing the entire bill. that scares the heck out of me because i am sure he would only cross out democratic earmarks or use it to punish ppl who did not obey him. - there is a senator named tom coburn whom is notorious for bringing to the congressional floor earmarks. by him bringing them up for a vote, it 'outs' them. - this point is very important - whichever party has the majority controls what earmarks go into legislation. this means that right now democrats have been literally shut out by the republicans from getting funds to their democratic districts. it is my belief that this is bush's way of punishing democratic districts. -the majority leader makes the final decision as to which earmarks are allowed... there is no vote on it... nothing. most of the time, nobody even knows about them which means a lot of the time congressman will vote on a bill that has this pork attached to it and never know they are approving it. - there is currently a bi-partisan effort in washington to pass what is called the pork-barrel reduction act. this legislation doesn't stop earmarks but rather, it brings them out into the open. http://www.thehill.com/thehill/export/thehill/news/frontpage/021406/news1.html  check out this pbs now video. it is short and you will learn a lot. http://www.pbs.org/now/politics/earmarksetc.html  there is a group called citizens against government waste that print annually print a book called "the pig book". this group specifically targets tracking earmarks. they actually have a database of earmarks you can check out at: http://www.cagw.org/site/pageserver?pagename=earmarkdatabase