President Obama said the nation’s mounting budget deficit calls for additional limits on earmarks “inserted into spending bills by members of Congress without adequate review.”

Some earmarks “support worthy projects in our local communities. But many others do not,” he said in his weekly radio and Internet address. As an example, he cited a multimillion-dollar project in Alaska, dubbed the “bridge to nowhere,” that would have connected an island of 50 residents with Ketchikan, a town of 8,000. Federal funding for the bridge was eventually dropped because of widespread criticism.

Though “earmarks like these” represent a “relatively small” part of the federal budget, Obama said, banning such directed funding items would show how serious the government is about getting its fiscal house in order.

“When it comes to signaling our commitment to fiscal responsibility, addressing them would have an important impact,” he said.

Record deficits prompted Obama to create a presidential commission which last week proposed a $3.8 trillion deficit- cutting plan that would reduce Social Security and Medicare and slash government spending. It would increase income taxes by $100 billion a year through a reduction in marginal rates and an end to all tax breaks.

Putting new limitations on earmarks, Obama said, would be a “step toward restoring public trust” that the federal government can reduce spending and live within its means.