Because Congress has yet to pass the spending bills necessary to fund the government over the next fiscal year, it has left itself with a limited number of options to fund the government.

The two most likely options are a “continuing resolution,” which would fund government at its current levels, or a pork-laden “omnibus,” which could span thousands of pages and contain thousands of hidden earmarks.  In the past, Congress has had mere minutes to review the contents of omnibus spending bills.  Due to the lack of adequate time for debate and review, egregious and wasteful projects are generally not uncovered until weeks after the passage of the pork-filled legislation.

If Congress had completed its primary constitutional responsibility of funding the government before year’s end, it would not face such a limited set of options.  American taxpayers must be vigilant and demand Congress not use the last days of the year to secretly pass wasteful and unnecessary pork projects.

This chart shows the estimated number of earmarks under the two scenarios of a continuing resolution or omnibus appropriations bill for 2008.