Banning Earmarks will do NOTHING. For one thing, it only makes up 1% of the budget. Take this from the last link “Earmarks are used to allocate a small fraction of already approved spending amounts.” See that? “Already Approved Spending.” Its not like earmarks are new spending.
Okay, so a bill comes to the floor. It is $100 million for infrastructure spending. A Senator from Kentucky says that, sure, he will support the bill, but only if this one project in Kentucky – in his district – gets $516,000 of that $100 million. Another Senator says she will support it, if this bridge building project in her state gets $300,000. The whole bill cost is still $100 million – just some of that money is earmarked for those two projects.
But, uninformed… actually, misinformed people will see the Republican move as being heroic and monumental. “Keep ’em Stupid, Keep ’em Republican!”