Earmarks are a particularly sinister sort of legislative corruption. Here's the way they work: A bill is heading on its way through the process established in the Constitution whereby matters become law in this country. This involves being properly introduced, vetted by the appropriate committees, and then voted on by both houses of Congress.

Now a Congressperson may not like this bill, may even be determined to stop it by every possible means; or, at the very least,  he will make a big public deal out of his opposition. Often, all it will take to get this legislator to look the other way is attach to the bill some earmark that he favors, and, for the sake of the earmark - usually unrelated to anything in the bill but something in the Congressperson's interest - he'll vote the bill through. The earmark only needs to pass with the bill; it does not need to be vetted.

Or, if a bill arises that seems fairly certain to pass, so popular and decent is it that no sane Congressperson would vote against it, and some member of Congress has this pet deal he's been trying unsuccessfully to get funded by any lawful means, he can get some of his pals to help him attach it as an earmark. Then those who oppose it will probably pass it anyway for the sake of getting the larger bill.

So consciences are compromised, channels are bypassed, and pork flows out of Washington by the billions through a process that members of Congress should be ashamed to admit, but most have used at one time or another.

So now the Republicans are going to put a stop to earmarks, at least, from their camp. Well, we'll see. It's one thing to make a big show, it's quite another to root out corruption from a system as rank as this one is with self-interest.

Earmarks are evidence of the entrenched nature of sin. Once it is bred into a system it takes over the workings of the system and can be very difficult to excise. This is especially so in the realm of politics, where efforts to "reform" a system can turn out to be Trojan horses filled with other kinds of corruption, just waiting to be unleashed against a public which has tired of proper vigilance.

The only sure way of excising sin out of political (or other) systems is for redeemed sinners to apply themselves to the task over the period of a generation or so. We have yet to see anything like this happen in America, but now would be a good time for it to begin. Pray for your members of Congress and, if the Lord moves you, let them know you'll be keeping an eye on this effort to reform a sin-encrusted system and return it to something like its original, pristine purity.

T. M. Moore