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The bill and explanatory report.. were about 14 inches tall, leaving many lawmakers baffled about its precise contents .. [but it turns out] the spending bill .. had something for virtually every lawmaker, including mountains of home-district projects. Taxpayers for Common Sense .. said it found 11,772 projects worth $15.8 billion. Projects included:

-$335,000 to protect sunflowers in North Dakota from blackbird damage.

-$60 million for a new courthouse in Las Cruces, N.M.

-$225,000 to study catfish genomes at Alabama's Auburn University.

- .. $2 million for the government to try buying back the former presidential yacht Sequoia.

Despite complaints the bill was too stingy, most Democrats supported it. .. They knew the alternative - holding spending to last year's levels - would be $4 billion tighter.