The folks at FreedomWorks.org have launched a micro-site to help drive its campaign to reform earmarks -- www.earmarkpledge.com.

From their About section:

FreedomWorks is continuing its fight to stop the irresponsible and wasteful process known as “earmarking” by creating a simple, personal pledge for federal lawmakers. The pledge gives signers an opportunity to go on the record against the broken earmark process.

All current Members of Congress as well as all serious contenders running for the U.S. House, Senate, as well as the Presidency will be asked to sign the following statement:

“Earmarking,” the practice by which members of Congress divert taxpayer funding to special projects outside of the normal competitive and merit-based review process, has grown out of control and is open to waste and abuse.

THEREFORE, I, __________________________, in my capacity as ________________________ (congressman/senator/president), do hereby pledge that I will personally support spending reform in Congress by refusing to seek, support, or enact earmarks during the appropriations process for fiscal year 2009.”

I asked the folks at FreedomWorks about the micro-site and got two responses worth sharing in this space.

* Dick Armey, Chairman, FreedomWorks: "We plan to use the internet to make it public who has signed our pledge and who refuses to do so. Our members will be able to focus their energy on calling those that haven't signed the pledge. Our website will allow us to put much-needed pressure on some of these folks, and we will have a record if they decide to drink backsliders wine on the issue in the future."

* Brendan Steinhauser, Director of Campaigns, FreedomWorks.org: "FreedomWorks seeks to empower grassroots citizens in the states to download our pledge, take it to district offices and ask their Congressmen to sign it. We are pursuing an inside and outside the beltway campaign to make it clear that the American people are tired of out-of-control spending. The Internet will allow us to efficiently coordinate this campaign across the country."

Nicely done FreedomWorks. Keep fighting the good fight.

An interesting battle is quietly taking place in the annals of Congress (and online) that probably won't make it very far beyond the Beltway chattering class but is worth noting in this space.

The turse is between Republican Leader John Boehner, Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and House bureaucrats (hired by Pelosi) who interpret silly, outdated, and flawed House Rules governing the use of websites by Members of Congress at their discretion.

The gist of the story is that Leader Boehner's office received approval in August to use the domain name, earmarkreform.house.gov, to serve as the House Republican's hub to reform earmarks. However, just two weeks after the website went live, the House Chief Administrative Officer, Dan Beard, rescinded his approval of the domain name, calling the previous approval a "mistake," and has shut the website down.

Boehner is, rightfully, crying foul. CQ has the full scoop:

[Boehner] said he was convinced the revocation was politically motivated.

“I am writing today to register my protest over this belated change,” he wrote Beard. “Changing its address now will inevitably hamper the effectiveness of the new Web site, much to the convenience of the majority that runs the House.”

Boehner went on to allege that the change was probably related to the continued stream of stories about Democratic House members and their use of the earmarking process.

The response to Boehner:

In a statement, Beard spokesman Jeff Ventura said permission for Boehner to use the Web site was issued mistakenly. He said the CAO had determined that the address violated using a slogan in the name of any site included in the house.gov domain and that Boehner had been asked to “transition” to another address.

“The CAO is now initiating a review” of all House Web addresses “to ensure compliance with traditional formatting,” Ventura said. Any sites that are in potential conflict with the House Administration Committee’s interpretation of the rule will be reviewed by the committee.

He said the House information resources office is “working with Mr. Boehner’s staff to make the transition as seamless as possible.”

Boehner is fighting a good, worthwhile fight that conservative activists could rally behind. In fact, over at Slatecard, our donor analytics show that the issue badge, Cut The Pork, is the #1 most frequently given issue badge and is the #2 issue badge with regard to total donations:

Top Issue Badges By Frequency
1. Cut The Pork: 54
2. Pro-Life: 48
3. Protect & Defend America: 46
4. Jobs & Economy: 36
5. Conservation Of Resources: 33

Top Issue Badges By Total Dollars
1. Protect & Defend America: $9,435.99
2. Cut The Pork: $6,593.00
3. Available and Affordable Health Care: $4,825.00
4. Jobs & Economy: $4,337.00
5. Defeat Radical Islam: $3,525.00

However, the truth of the matter is that, when live and operational, the website probably wasn't actually doing much good with regard to changing the narrative about House Republicans and earmarks. However, it was a strong step in the right direction as a positive embrace of the Internet by Republicans and a very real hub of information/efforts toward one single goal.

But, now, in its death -- we're all writing about the fact that John Boehner's efforts to reform earmarks is being crippled not by a team of appropriators -- but by Nancy Pelosi and her liberal allies.

That's a win for his communications team. A scoop of porridge if you'll have it.

U.S. Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) is not even up for re-election in 2008 but he has such a good understanding of the importance of the modern world that he's invested resources to revitalize his website, www.JimDeMint.com.

DeMint and his team are smart. As the leader in the Senate on earmark reform today, he recognizes that he needs to be using that energy to help collect "signatures" on his "petition." In other words, if people support him today, they'll likely support him tomorrow with a nice donation or other support.

Like Virginia's Democratic candidate for Senate, Mark Warner, DeMint's doing so with a landing page which includes a YouTube video message from the Senator:

The rest of DeMint's site is good. It includes all of the necessary links to socnets, has a blog, and is easy on the eyes.

Now we can only hope that Senator DeMint continues his leadership in this space by pointing his colleague Senator Sununu in a similar direction (before it's too late).

Good work Team DeMint.