podcast and you made a compelling constitutionalti argumenton about why earmarks ae so wrong. could you quickly try and capture that for us tonight? it s been a principle of a government since f the days of e magna carta, the power toen appropriate funds should be separate from the power to spenu those funds. congress appropriate funds but can t spends them and the president spends funds but can t appropriate them.ia inte 1817 president james madisr vetoed a o bill with earmarks which he said subverted on separation of power as and wasted money on what he said were the worst and uselessmo projectsne. that hasn t changed. steve: it adds up to a lot of t money, doesn tha it.