Congress. And their ever-lovin’ earmarks.

Highway money, ie money that taxpayers send to Washington in the form of gasoline taxes, is being hijacked by lobbyists and insiders for pet projects that have little or nothing to do with adding road capacity where it is actually needed in North Carolina. Say, places like Mecklenburg County.

Instead, we are paving cow paths all over the state in the name of — what for it — economic development. And it ain’t gonna stop:

Rep. G.K. Butterfield, a Wilson Democrat, said he is trying to get whatever he can for his district, which includes traditionally poor areas of northeastern North Carolina.

“For those of us who represent rural communities, it’s the way for us to get resources that we otherwise would not get,” Butterfield said. “I am going to avail myself of every earmark opportunity that exists and not apologize for it.”

Well, I am not going to apologize for noting that G.K. Butterfield is a worthless sack of protoplasm and garden-variety shakedown artist.