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After the outrage we saw from members on both sides of the aisle the evening House Speaker John Boehner cancelled the vote on hurricane Sandy relief and the subsequent displays by Gov. Chris Christie and Rep. Peter King, among others, leave it to Bill Kristol who has never seen a dime of military spending he didn't love, to come to the defense of John Boehner.

Sadly, as Media Matters noted, he wasn't alone. And his fellow guest on Bret Baier's Special Report, Charles Krauthammer was right there with him as well. The excuse given by Kristol and Krauthammer here was primarily based on concerns that the bill was larded up with some pork that the House didn't have sufficient time to look at, even though the Senate had passed their bill a week before they were asking for this vote to be taken in the House. If that was a real concern, apparently it doesn't matter much now, since Boehner caved to the political pressure and is going to have the House vote "to shore up the National Flood Insurance Program on Friday and will vote on another $51 billion Sandy spending package on Jan. 15."

Whatever the excuses, it seems they were more than happy to give cover to Boehner and the House Republicans for being incapable of being responsible and caring about doing the job of actually governing this country, rather than continued political brinksmanship we've seen from the House and John Boehner and his cohorts taking their vacation time around the holidays, instead of tending to the needs of those suffering in the aftermath of that storm.

Here's more from the Media Matters post on Kristol:

Weekly Standard's Bill Kristol: "I Think The Speaker Was Entirely Right To Pull The Bill." During an appearance on Fox News' Special Report, Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol said, "I think the Speaker was entirely right to pull the bill." He added: "$60 billion is about one-tenth of this year's federal domestic discretionary nondefense spending. This is not like, gee, a couple hundred million dollars for some really important, urgent thing." [Fox News, Special Report with Bret Baier, 1/2/13]

Kristol never seems to have those same concerns about our military industrial complex. That's the only jobs program that Republicans seem to support and I've never heard Kristol express any concern over what the waste there is contributing to our budget deficit. Unlimited funds for the Pentagon. Hurricane victims, well you can wait. And don't dare include any pork in that spending because lord knows we can't have that as long as it's going for people who just had their homes destroyed in a storm and to help their state's infrastructure recover.

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As Cenk pointed out in the clip above, so much for these so-called "fiscal conservatives" who pretend like they're against pork barrel spending. Richard Shelby, hypocrisy is thy name, but what's new?

‘Fiscal Conservative’ Richard Shelby Forces NASA To Spend $1.4 Million A Day On Program It Doesn’t Want:

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) is a “self-professed fiscal conservative” who often rails against government spending and the supposed fiscally imprudent policies of his progressive opponents. He recently put out a statement that said, “Washington must put its fiscal house in order. American taxpayers are rightly infuriated by the federal government’s disregard for the same economic principles that govern every household and business budget.” Yet when it comes to pork barrel spending for his home state, he is willing to go to extraordinary lengths to waste taxpayers’ money. The Chicago Tribune reports today that a provision Shelby inserted into the 2010 budget that has survived both recent continuing resolutions is costing taxpayers more than a million dollars every single day. The “Shelby provision,” as it is called, forces NASA to spend $1.4 million daily on the Constellation moon program, which it already canceled and doesn’t even want... Read on...

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Looks like this one has got the conservatives up in arms. Seems the Republicans are not looking very serious about their pledge to end earmarks with this appointment.

Conservatives upset that 'Prince of Pork' will rule spending panel:

High-profile conservatives are questioning the decision by House Republicans to place Rep. Hal Rogers (R-Ky.), a veteran lawmaker with a history of earmarking, in charge of a key spending committee.

Richard Viguerie, a longtime conservative activist, said Rogers's election as the next Appropriations Committee chairman (along with Michigan GOP Rep. Fred Upton's selection as chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee) "should cause all conservatives and Tea Partiers to doubt how serious the Republican leadership is about cleaning up the culture of waste, seniority and corruption in Congress.""Grassroots conservatives are unhappy with the status quo in Washington, and Speaker-designate Boehner needs to balance this slap in the face with something to show conservatives that he is truly committed to reversing the size of government," Viguerie wrote in a blog post Thursday.

'Prince of pork' wins top seat on House Appropriations Cmte.:

U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers — known for his ability to secure funding for projects in his Eastern Kentucky district — was selected Tuesday as the new chairman of House Appropriations, the most powerful committee in Congress.

The 5th District Republican was chosen by the GOP steering committee in a secret vote late Tuesday afternoon. The decision is expected to be ratified Wednesday by the rest of the House Republicans. [...]

In the lead-up to the selection, some conservatives argued that neither Rogers nor Lewis was qualified to be the chairman because of their past history as vigorous users of earmarks, special requests for spending on state and local projects.

Critics dubbed Rogers “the Prince of Pork” and called his earmark-benefitted district, where everything from highway construction to homeland security contracts had the Kentuckian's help over the years, “Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood.”

Rogers secured 137 earmarks worth $251.9 million between 2008 and 2010, according to LegisStorm, a nonpartisan congressional watchdog group. That ranked him 99th among Senate and House members with earmarks.

Transcript below the fold.

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December 13, 2009 C-SPAN

From The Hill--McCain calls out earmarks in omnibus:

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) took his crusade against pork projects to Twitter today, tweeting this about an earmark for urban renewal in Scranton, PA: $292,200 4 elimination of slum & blight in Scranton, PA – I think the cast from the Office introduced...@rainnwilson was this you? Scranton, of course, is home to NBC's "The Office." Rainn Wilson plays the character of Dwight.

Heather: Sen. John McCain was also not happy about money being spent for irritable bowel syndrome, surgical operations in space and a rural bus program in Hawaii. McCain spent part of this little tirade carping about Washington caring about Wall Street instead of Main Street. That's pretty rich coming from the guy who had Foreclosure Phil Gramm as his economic advisor until he stepped down after calling Americans a nation of whiners.