Last week, anti-pork bloggers scored a victory when they recast Sen. Ted Stevens’s “secret” obstruction of the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act — which will make it harder for him and others to siphon dollars to their pet projects — as a whodunit. This focused attention on Stevens, leading to his capitulation and the passage of the bill. But the time for self-congratulation is over. This week it’s House conservatives who are pushing for more spending transparency, and they need help getting an important reform past the not-so-secret obstruction of their powerful colleagues on the House Appropriations Committee.

The House plans to vote this Thursday on a sweeping rule change that would impose new disclosure requirements on any congressman who sponsors an earmark. Right now, there are no rules governing earmark disclosure in the House. Under the new rules, the House Appropriations Committee would be required to provide a list of earmarks in each bill: who added them, who will benefit from them, and how much they will cost.

This rule would also apply to authorized spending like last year’s bloated transportation bill, making it even more comprehensive than the earmark reforms proposed in the House lobbying-reform bill. In addition, it would require the disclosure of special tax breaks to single beneficiaries, thus exposing “tax earmarks.” As a House rule change, it would apply only to House bills — but any earmarks added in conference and then returned to the House would also have to be disclosed before a final vote.

Some skeptics argue that more transparency won’t reduce wasteful spending because congressmen love to talk about how much bacon they’re bringing home. But they underestimate the public’s — and, in particular, conservatives’ — growing distaste for pork. More important, certain committees and state delegations have disproportionate power when it comes to earmarking. Bringing these disparities out in the open will better enable House conservatives to rein in their profligacy. Not to mention the effect of the media and the blogosphere, which will connect the dots between lobbyists, vote-trading, and earmarks.

But perhaps the best way to judge whether this measure would reduce wasteful spending is to look at who is opposing it. House appropriators — the biggest spenders on the Hill — are offering every excuse they can think of to stymie the rule change. Last spring they fought earmark reform by arguing that disclosure rules had unfairly singled out the Appropriations Committee. Now that the new proposal also includes authorized spending and tax bills, they are carping over some other, minor exceptions to justify their opposition. Their goal is to make disclosure so onerous that no one in the Republican conference will support it; and with Democrats likely to vote against the rule for partisan reasons, the 37 Republican appropriators may well have the power to block it if they keep inventing excuses.

Conservative representatives shouldn’t let them get away with it. House rule changes don’t require Senate or White House approval, which means that, if passed by a simple majority, earmark transparency would take effect immediately. The last thing the GOP needs right now is for conservative voters disgusted with spending excess to stay home on Election Day. This just might give them a reason to show up at the polls.