One of the problems with having a large centralized government is that no human being can track everything it does. Ditto such a large Congress, which is largely unaccountable to the people. One way they're unaccountable is by the way they name bills. HappyFunPundit, for example, notes some of the astonishing things that went into the recent "Supplemental spending bill to enhance Homeland Security", including funding for puppy breeding research, work on the Cattle Genome Project, and a program to encourage senior citizens to eat more fresh produce.

Before you say, "Wait! They are accountable! Doesn't the fact that you're pointing this out prove that?" The answer, dear friends, is no, because virtually every bill is like this, and bills routinely run thousands of pages. In point of fact, most members of Congress don't even read most of the bills they vote on anymore. They're mostly drawn up by congressional staff, and our elected officials simply rely on summaries their staffs (staves?) provide.

One of the things the much-reviled Contract With America included was something called the Line-Item Veto. The Gingrich congress actually passed this, giving Bill Clinton the power to veto specific spending lines in bills. Most governors of states have this power, and Presidents used to have it at one time. For some reason (you can guess), certain Powers That Be hated the idea, and the Supreme Court promptly took it away before Clinton or any other President could use it.

A damn shame, that. No human being can possibly keep track of everything the Congress passes, even if it's his full-time job. Expecting the average voter to do this, and claiming that, as a result, our representatives are "accountable to the people for what they do," is the biggest joke in politics today.