All Entries in the "Corruption" Category

Dodd’s Chief Counsel Bought Financial Stocks During 2008 Crisis

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd’s chief counsel in 2008 traded stock in Morgan Stanley, Wells Fargo & Co., American International Group Inc. and other rescued companies as the panel considered legislation to address the credit crisis, according to her financial disclosure form filed with the Senate.

Amy Friend, 51, who is now leading the panel’s effort to write a bill overhauling Wall Street regulations, bought $1,000- to-$15,000 stakes in four banks, weeks after Dodd hired her in January 2008, the form shows. She also owned shares of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, AIG and other insurance firms, according to the disclosure document, which she signed on June 5, 2009.

The transactions, permissible under Senate rules, included buying $1,000 to $15,000 of Federal Home Loan Bank bonds and Fannie Mae debt in June and July, 2008. On July 30 of that year, then-President George W. Bush signed into law a Dodd-sponsored bill setting out new regulations for the housing finance agencies and allowing the Treasury Department to give them cash injections.

Full Story: Dodd’s Chief Counsel Bought Financial Stocks During 2008 Crisis | MichaelMoore.com.

Dems: Memo On Medicare Changes Isn’t Ours — It’s A GOP ‘Hoax’

Democrats today are accusing Republicans of circulating a fraudulent memo that claims to be sent to “Democratic health and communications staff” and which suggests the majority party leadership wants to make big changes to Medicare next year after health care passes.

A senior Democratic leadership aide told TPMDC in an interview the memo, obtained and printed by Politico and leading the Drudge Report this afternoon a few days ahead of the health care vote Sunday, is “a hoax.”

[READ THE MEMO HERE]

“We have checked with every Democratic office, no one has ever seen it. It did not come out of a Democratic office,” the aide said, adding that media outlets printing the memo have not checked with leadership offices if the memo is authentic. A second Democratic leadership aide confirmed the memo was not sent by the Democrats. A third Democratic aide also said the memo is fake, citing the “draft” stamp and saying no one uses such things.

Full Story: Dems: Memo On Medicare Changes Isn’t Ours — It’s A GOP ‘Hoax’ | TPMDC.

MAPLight.org Shows Links Between Politicians’ Votes, Campaign Contributions

It’s no mystery that money has become a key factor in American politics. But until now it’s been difficult to show voters just how closely politicians hew to the interests of their political patrons and campaign donors.

MAPLight.org, a non-partisan web site, hopes to change that. The site uses three data sets to create a detailed picture that illustrates money’s influence over elected officials: campaign contributions, voting records, and the supporting and opposing interests of a bill.

Dylan Ratigan lavished praise on the web site during his show Thursday and interviewed MAPlight’s director

Full Story: MAPLight.org Shows Links Between Politicians’ Votes, Campaign Contributions.

Boehner Tells Bankers To Fight Financial Reform:

‘Don’t Let Those Little Punk Staffers Take Advantage Of You’

This week, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT) released the latest version of his financial regulatory reform bill, which aims to correct the deficiencies in the financial system that led to 2008’s economic crisis. The House of Representatives has already passed a comprehensive regulatory reform bill, and now that Dodd has given up on negotiating with recalcitrant Republicans, he is moving on an expedited timeline, with a markup scheduled for Monday.

It’s taken the Senate a year and a half after the financial crisis to even get to this point, but House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) told “an enthusiastic crowd of bankers” today that, even if the Senate passes a bill, reconciling it with the House version will take another year. “If the Senate is able to produce a bill, I think it’s just as likely that we’ll be talking about the same issue a year from now as we are right now,” Boehner said at the American Bankers Association government relations summit.

Boehner then added that the bankers should be standing up for themselves against “those little punk staffers” trying to write new regulations:

Full Story: Think Progress » Boehner Tells Bankers To Fight Financial Reform: ‘Don’t Let Those Little Punk Staffers Take Advantage Of You’.

The Green They Steal, The Greed They Wear

A St. Patrick’s Day Lament

by Michael Moore

Friends,

It was amazing. Every story on the front page of Monday’s New York Times told the story of the Age of Greed during which a system known as capitalism is slowly, but surely, killing us:

Insurance company greed: “Millions Spent to Sway Democrats on Health Care”

War profiteers: “Contractors Tied to Effort to Track and Kill Militants”

There’s no profit in repairing our infrastructure: “Repair Costs Daunting as Water Lines Crumble”

China, the bank: “China Uses Rules on Global Trade to Its Advantage”

You mean NAFTA didn’t improve life in Mexico: “Two Drug Slayings in Mexico Rock US Consulate”

What happens when Big Food profits from hurting kids: “Forget Goofing Around: Recess Has New Boss”

Full Story: The Green They Steal, The Greed They Wear | CommonDreams.org.

One-year freeze on earmarks fails in Senate, splits GOP

The Senate on Tuesday overwhelmingly defeated a bid to freeze spending earmarks for a year.

Lawmakers voted 68-29 against an amendment by Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., to impose a one-year moratorium on earmarks. Twenty-four fellow Republicans voted for DeMint’s measure, while 15 GOP senators voted against it.

The vote came six days after House Democratic leaders banned earmarks to defense contractors and other private companies, limiting them to state or local governments and nonprofit groups.

DeMint and fellow conservative Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., engaged in a brief but fierce debate on the Senate floor before the vote.

Full Story: One-year freeze on earmarks fails in Senate, splits GOP | McClatchy.

Did Obama make a backroom deal to kill the public option?

A New York Times reporter has confirmed that President Obama made a deal with hospital lobbyists back in August of 2009, that promised there would be no public option.

Obama, on many occasions made speeches supporting a public option but this explains why he never did anything to get it included in a health care bill.

Nancy Pelosi had said only a few days ago that a public option wouldnt be in the House bill largely because Obama never fought for it,, never pushed for it and never supported it. And now we know why. Because of this backroom deal with lobbyists he made back in August promising there would be no public option.

Full Story: Did Obama make a backroom deal to kill the public option?.

NY Times Reporter Confirms Obama Made Deal to Kill Public Option

For months I’ve been reporting in The Huffington Post that President Obama made a backroom deal last summer with the for-profit hospital lobby that he would make sure there would be no national public option in the final health reform legislation. (See here, here and here). I’ve been increasingly frustrated that except for an initial story last August in the New York Times, no major media outlet has picked up this important story and investigated further.

Hopefully, that’s changing. On Monday, Ed Shultz interviewed New York Times Washington reporter David Kirkpatrick on his MSNBC TV show, and Kirkpatrick confirmed the existence of the deal. Shultz quoted Chip Kahn, chief lobbyist for the for-profit hospital industry on Kahn’s confidence that the White House would honor the no public option deal, and Kirkpatrick responded:

“That’s a lobbyist for the hospital industry and he’s talking about the hospital industry’s specific deal with the White House and the Senate Finance Committee and, yeah, I think the hospital industry’s got a deal here. There really were only two deals, meaning quid pro quo handshake deals on both sides, one with the hospitals and the other with the drug industry. And I think what you’re interested in is that in the background of these deals was the presumption, shared on behalf of the lobbyists on the one side and the White House on the other, that the public option was not going to be in the final product.”

Full Story: Miles Mogulescu: NY Times Reporter Confirms Obama Made Deal to Kill Public Option.

AIPAC Lashes Out At Obama Administration Over Israel Statements

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the pro-Israel lobbying group, released a statement over the weekend lacing into President Obama for what it calls “escalated rhetoric” on the part of the administration in response to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s push for new housing units in East Jerusalem.

“The Obama Administration’s recent statements regarding the U.S. relationship with Israel are a matter of serious concern. AIPAC calls on the Administration to take immediate steps to defuse the tension with the Jewish State,” according to the statement. “The Administration should make a conscious effort to move away from public demands and unilateral deadlines directed at Israel, with whom the United States shares basic, fundamental, and strategic interests.”

The Israeli plan to add additional housing units in East Jerusalem came during Vice President Joe Biden’s recent trip to the region to help jumpstart Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. Even Netanyahu acknowledged the timing of the announcement was “unfortunate.”

Full Story: AIPAC Lashes Out At Obama Administration Over Israel Statements.

David Axelrod: Health Care Lobbyists Descending Like ‘Locusts’ On Congress

White House Senior Adviser David Axelrod warned on Sunday that health care industry lobbyists were descending on skeptical Democratic lawmakers “like locusts” in an effort to scuttle the final vote on a reform bill.

Appearing on ABC’s “This Week,” Axelrod rationalized the difficulties of getting a majority vote behind a final health care package by pointing to the pressures these lawmakers face.

“It has been a long and arduous debate,” he said. “It is a tough issue for members of congress because there is an enormous lobbying campaign going on, on the other side. Lobbyists from the insurance industry descending on Capital Hill like locusts and trying to pressure people to vote against this bill. There is a lot of pressure on people, but I believe we will be there at the end of the day.”

Full Story: David Axelrod: Health Care Lobbyists Descending Like ‘Locusts’ On Congress.

The Democrats’ scam becomes more transparent

Glenn Greenwald -

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about what seemed to be a glaring (and quite typical) scam perpetrated by Congressional Democrats: all year long, they insisted that the White House and a majority of Democratic Senators vigorously supported a public option, but the only thing oh-so-unfortunately preventing its enactment was the filibuster: sadly, we have 50 but not 60 votes for it, they insisted. Democratic pundits used that claim to push for “filibuster reform,” arguing that if only majority rule were required in the Senate, then the noble Democrats would be able to deliver all sorts of wonderful progressive reforms that they were truly eager to enact but which the evil filibuster now prevents. In response, advocates of the public option kept arguing that the public option could be accomplished by reconciliation — where only 50 votes, not 60, would be required — but Obama loyalists scorned that reconciliation proposal, insisting (at least before the Senate passed a bill with 60 votes) that using reconciliation was Unserious, naive, procedurally impossible, and politically disastrous.

But all those claims were put to the test — all those bluffs were called — once the White House decided that it had to use reconciliation to pass a final health care reform bill. That meant that any changes to the Senate bill (which had passed with 60 votes) — including the addition of the public option — would only require 50 votes, which Democrats assured progressives all year long that they had. Great news for the public option, right? Wrong. As soon as it actually became possible to pass it, the 50 votes magically vanished. Senate Democrats (and the White House) were willing to pretend they supported a public option only as long as it was impossible to pass it. Once reconciliation gave them the opportunity they claimed all year long they needed — a “majority rule” system — they began concocting ways to ensure that it lacked 50 votes.

Full Story: The Democrats’ scam becomes more transparent – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com.

Why the Stupak amendment should be striken and Bart Stupak censured

Every member of congress when they are elected, puts their hand on the bible and swears to uphold the constitution of the United States.

Bart Stupak has violated his oath of office and the Conference of Catholic Bishops violated their tax exempt status regarding the Stupak amendment in the healthcare bill and both should be punished appropriately. The question is will anyone have the guts to do it?

Stupak’s arrogance in inviting representatives of the Conference of Catholic Bishops to write legislation regarding the abortion amendment, violates the first amendment to the constitution.

Full Story: Why the Stupak amendment should be striken and Bart Stupak censured.

Senators Target Wall Street, With Goldman Sachs In Mind

A quintet of Democratic senators introduced legislation Wednesday to specifically prohibit investment maneuvers that have been likened to “selling a car with faulty brakes and then buying an insurance policy on the buyer of those cars”.

Senators Jeff Merkley (Ore.), Carl Levin (Mich.), Sherrod Brown (Ohio), Ted Kaufman (Del.) and Jeanne Shaheen (N.H.) are pushing the Obama administration’s proposal to rein in banks’ Wall Street-like practices, such as trading securities for their own profit, while they enjoy the protections afforded by U.S. taxpayers through deposit insurance and access to cheap funds courtesy of short-term loans from the Federal Reserve. Their legislation also attempts to sever the ties between banks and largely unregulated hedge funds and private equity funds — firms that invest and bet for the benefit of their investors.

Those two proposals try to resurrect the wall between Main Street banking and Wall Street trading, a Depression-era reform that was torn down during the Clinton administration. After excessive risk-taking by Wall Street culminated in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, necessitating hundreds of billions of dollars in a taxpayer-funded bailout, top economists and Wall Street veterans have come out in favor of at least partially restoring that divide.

Full Story: Senators Target Wall Street, With Goldman Sachs In Mind.

When Jesus Attacks! Why don’t we care that the Catholic Church is officially whipping Congress?

It’s Time to Separate Church and State, Once and for All

If you recall, anti-Catholic prejudice was once a problem for Catholic politicians in the US. John F. Kennedy went so far as to address the issue head-on in his 1960 campaign – probably because he didn’t feel he had much choice. Here’s what he told the Greater Houston Ministerial Association on September 12 of that year:

I am not the Catholic candidate for President. I am the Democratic Party’s candidate for President who also happens to be a Catholic. I do not speak for my Church on public matters — and the Church does not speak for me.

He went on to assert his respect for the separation of church and state and vowed that Catholic officials would not dictate policy to him. As noted in part 1, the times, they have a-changed.

In 1960 it was “anti-Catholic prejudice.” In 2010 it’s “empirical evidence of improper behavior by the Roman Catholic Church.” And it’s time it stopped. Cold.

Full Story: Scholars and Rogues » When Jesus Attacks! Why don’t we care that the Catholic Church is officially whipping Congress?.

Will Stupak and the Catholic Bishops Kill Health-Care Reform?

The outcome of the battle for health-care reform may rest on the say-so of one man, Rep. Bart Stupak. But he’s got an army of Catholic bishops pulling his strings.

With the congressional spring recess fast approaching, it’s crunch time, once again, for health-care reform. And once again, one Democrat, Rep. Bart Stupak, is threatening to kill the bill — with the help of 10 or so anti-choice compatriots — if the final deal does not include the draconian language on abortion contained in the health-care reform legislation passed by the House in November.

Stupak no doubt feels like the big man in this fight, the guy who can stop the clock and deprive some 30 million uninsured Americans a shot at having health-care coverage. In truth, however, the big men are the ones in mitres and vestments: the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. It was they who demanded the Stupak amendment to the House bill, which bars any American who receives a government subsidy to purchase health insurance through a government-run insurance exchange from purchasing a plan that includes coverage for abortion.

Full Story: Will Stupak and the Catholic Bishops Kill Health-Care Reform? | News & Politics | AlterNet.

Another Wall Street Bonus Tax Falters In Congress

Few topics have generated as much political heat between Main Street and Wall Street as the billions of dollars in bonuses handed out at financial companies that received federal bailouts. But Washington’s efforts to claim some of that money for taxpayers continue to falter.

The latest attempt is a measure authored by Democratic Sens. Jim Webb of Virginia and Barbara Boxer of California. It would impose a one-time 50 percent tax on 2009 bonuses of more than $400,000 paid by the 13 firms receiving the most federal bailout money.

The plan appears to be crumbling amid opposition from two financial industry-lobbying powerhouses and hesitation among moderate Democrats and key New York politicians, including Sen. Charles Schumer. It has little chance of surviving a procedural vote expected late Tuesday, according to legislative aides and industry lobbyists.

Full Story: Another Wall Street Bonus Tax Falters In Congress.

Thin wall separates lobbyist contributions and earmarks

Lawmakers Deny That Lobbying Affects Earmarks. Numbers Suggest Otherwise

House Appropriations defense subcommittee member James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.) works hard at fundraising: Two to three times a week, he telephones contributors to ask for more. Yet, according to the account he supplied to the Office of Congressional Ethics last year, he is unaware of “who made donations” or how much they gave, and so that information plays no role in his earmarking — the systematic granting of public funds for mostly private purposes.

Fellow subcommittee member Norm Dicks (D-Wash.) similarly presides over fundraisers arranged by his staff for defense firms and lobbyists every three months or so, according to his office’s account. An aide in charge of Dicks’s earmarks attends the fundraising events. But Dicks and the aide told investigators they were unaware of the substantial overlap between defense industry contributions to Dicks and his earmarks to contributors.

The House ethics committee on Feb. 26 exonerated Dicks, Moran and five other defense subcommittee members of allegations that they had abused their offices by, in essence, selling earmarks to donors. In so doing, it drew heavily on promises such as these by lawmakers and staff members that their campaign fundraising operations had been carefully walled off from their earmarking decisions. Otherwise, their actions would violate laws and rules that bar any link between such donations and legislative acts.

Full Story: Thin wall separates lobbyist contributions and earmarks – washingtonpost.com.

Dodd to Defang Financial Reform?

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd's effort to house a new Consumer Financial Protection Agency under the Federal Reserve is fatally flawed. For the past two decades, the Fed has aligned itself with any policy that boosts short-term profits for America's largest banks, regardless of the consequences for consumers or the broader economy. But even worse is Dodd's effort to block the new agency from enforcing the rules it writes, leaving enforcement up to the same regulators who ignored rampant predation and outright fraud throughout the housing bubble.

The bank lobby and its boosters in the Republican Party have been targeting the CFPA since President Barack Obama proposed creating it in July. It’s easy to see why: for the first time, a regulatory agency would be concerned with protecting the public, rather than bank balance sheets. That’s good news for the economy, but bad news for quarterly earnings at major U.S. banks. Republicans are doing anything they can to gut the proposal, and several back-lobby-backed Democrats are reluctant to push for a strong agency. But instead of forcing lawmakers to cast vote siding with the bankers, Dodd appears ready to let the agency die without even extracting a political pound of flesh.

If the new CFPA cannot enforce its own rules, it is effectively powerless. All the good rules in the world don’t amount to anything without strong enforcement, and the existing federal bank regulators–the Federal Reserve, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) and the Office of Thrift Supervision (OCC)–have proven time and again that they simply are not interested in enforcing consumer protection laws.

Full Story: Dodd to Defang Financial Reform?.

Obama’s olympic NAFTAgate lie under scrutiny in Canada

In Canada its called Obama’s NAFTAgate. When Barrack Obama was running for president during the Ohio primary he was caught in a blatant, cynical and unconscionable lie to the people of Ohio, exploiting their pain and fear over their faltering economy and massive unemployment.

Obama’s political dishonesty and the attempted cover it up by his economic advisor Austan Goolsebee who is still a member of Obama’s White House economic team, went largely ignored by a mainstream press intent on seeing Obama elected.

While running against Hillary Clinton in the Ohio primary, a state that had lost 265,000 jobs even before the economic crisis, Obama blamed NAFTA for the loss of jobs and used it to attack Hillary Clinton since it was Bill Clinton’s decision to implement NAFTA.

….Obama told the voters of Ohio that if he is elected he would abolish NAFTA ……

Full Story: Obama’s olympic NAFTAgate lie under scrutiny in Canada.

Rangel stepping down from tax-writing chairmanship

Rangel tells Pelosi he’s ready to step down from Ways & Means chairmanship during ethics probe

Rep. Charles Rangel announced Wednesday he will temporarily step down as chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, saying he didn’t want his ethics controversy to jeopardize election prospects for fellow Democrats.

The 20-term Harlem congressman held a news conference on short notice, telling reporters, “My chairmanship is bringing so much attention to the press, and in order to avoid my colleagues having to defend me during their elections, I have this morning sent a letter” asking House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “to grant me a leave of absence until such time as the ethics committee completes its work.”

The 79-year-old Rangel’s decision was another jarring setback for President Barack Obama and majority Democrats in Congress, coming at a time when the party is scrambling to save sweeping health care overhaul legislation that has been pending on Capitol Hill for well over a year and still assessing a surging anti-incumbent fervor among the voters.

Full Story: Rangel stepping down from tax-writing chairmanship | Raw Story.

Two more House Dems demand Rangel step down as panel head – TheHill.com

Two politically vulnerable Democrats on Monday called for Rep. Charles Rangel to step down as Ways and Means Committee chairman.

Reps. Betty Sutton (Ohio) and Harry Mitchell (Ariz.) have joined the ranks of Democrats calling for the New York Democrat to relinquish his gavel in the wake of the ethics committee finding that Rangel violated House rules.

“I think that in order to preserve the public trust, which is of the highest priority, Rep. Rangel should, at this point, step aside as chair of the Ways and Means Committee,” Sutton said in a statement to The Hill. “Our nation is facing many challenges and we must put all our energy, without distraction or question, into meeting those challenges.”

Full Story: Two more House Dems demand Rangel step down as panel head – TheHill.com.

Reform Déjà Vu: Democrats Follow Failed Health Care Strategy and Preemptively Surrender on Consumer Financial Protection Agency

A “doom loop.” That’s what Andy Haldane, executive director of financial stability for the Bank of England, warned last fall would happen if serious financial reform wasn’t enacted.

Well, we appear to be a step closer to that “doom loop” with the leak this weekend of Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd’s plan for a seriously watered-down consumer financial protection agency.

Back in June, President Obama released a proposal calling for the creation of a Consumer Financial Protection Agency that would be “independent,” with “broad authority” and the power to “combat the worst abuses in mortgage markets.” The agency, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said, would “have an independent seat at the table in our financial regulatory system.”

Full Story: Arianna Huffington: Reform Déjà Vu: Democrats Follow Failed Health Care Strategy and Preemptively Surrender on Consumer Financial Protection Agency.

Solid Evidence of GOP’s Unconstitutional Abuse of Power

Nearly 300 Bills Have Passed in House Since Current 111th Congress Took Office Nearly 14 Months Ago — Many With Broad Bipartisan Support — Only to be Tied Up by Unprecedented Brick Wall of Republican Filibusters in Senate; Minority Party Has No Constitutional Authority to Hold All Legislation Hostage by forcing 60-Vote ‘Super Majority’ in 100-Member Chamber

To say that the Republicans in the U.S. Senate are engaging in an unconstitutional abuse of power by blocking virtually all legislation proposed by either the Obama administration or the Democratic majority in Congress is not just political grandstanding. Nearly 300 bills that have passed in the House since the current 111th Congress took office 14 months ago have been blocked in the Senate by Republican filibusters. There is nothing in the Constitution that gives the minority party in the Senate any authority to hold these bills hostage by forcing a 60-vote “super majority.” (Chart courtesy McClatchy Newspapers)

Full Story: The ‘Skeeter Bites Report: Letter From the Editor: Solid Evidence of GOP’s Unconstitutional Abuse of Power.

QUID PRO DOUGH: House Ethics Panel Rules It’s Okay To Steer Contracts To Campaign Donors

The House ethics committee ruled Friday that seven lawmakers who steered hundreds of millions of dollars in largely no-bid contracts to clients of a lobbying firm had not violated any rules or laws by also collecting large campaign donations from those contractors.

In a 305-page report, the ethics committee declared that lawmakers are free to raise campaign money from the very companies they are benefiting so long as the deciding factors in granting those “earmarks” are “criteria independent” of the contributions. The report served as a blunt rejection of ethics watchdogs and a different group of congressional investigators, who have contended that in some instances the connection between donations and earmarks was so close that it had to be inappropriate.

“Simply because a member sponsors an earmark for an entity that also happens to be a campaign contributor does not, on these two facts alone, support a claim that a member’s actions are being influenced by campaign contributions,” the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct said in a unanimous statement.

Full Story: Ethics panel clears 7 on earmarks – washingtonpost.com.

OPS:  Ethics? Really?

Top Obama ally broke Congress ethics rules

A powerful Democratic lawmaker and strong ally of President Barack Obama drew a formal rebuke Thursday from congressional ethics watchdogs over corporate-funded travel to the Caribbean.

Representative Charles Rangel, chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, violated House limits on gifts and must repay the cost of the trips, the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct said in a report.

The ethics panel, in a finding dated Friday and obtained by AFP, said publishing its findings would serve as a “public admonishment” of Rangel.

Full Story: Top Obama ally broke Congress ethics rules – Yahoo! News.

The Last Honest Republican?

Len Hart,  -

Dwight David Eisenhower, familiarly called ‘Ike’, may very well have been the last honest Republican. As both General and President, Eisenhower held his positions in ‘good faith’; he was not a ‘crook’. Bertolt Brecht had said: “A man who does not know the truth is just an idiot but a man who knows the truth and calls it a lie is a crook.” By that standard, Nixon was a crook, the progenitor of the modern Republican who lies to conceal his/her true position. When Nixon said ‘I am NOT a crook’, one knew immediately that he was one.

Arguably a great general, the man who supervised allied forces landing in Normandy in preparation for the final assault on Hitler’s Third Reich, Eisenhower made the best case for peace, putting forward five ‘precepts’ for world peace in what is often called the ‘Cross of Iron Speech’. Tragically, Eisenhower’s five principles have been hypocritically eschewed since, primarily because the GOP leadership fell to the likes of Nixon, Reagan. Bush Sr and the Shrub. The four of them failed the economy, failed the economy, failed the people, failed the Constitution. All were crooks who whored themselves to the very Military-Industrial Complex that Ike had warned about. The GOP has been crooked ever since.

In that spring of victory the soldiers of the Western Allies met the soldiers of Russia in the center of Europe. They were triumphant comrades in arms. Their peoples shared the joyous prospect of building, in honor of their dead, the only fitting monument-an age of just peace. All these war-weary peoples shared too this concrete, decent purpose: to guard vigilantly against the domination ever again of any part of the world by a single, unbridled aggressive power.

Full Story: The Existentialist Cowboy: The Last Honest Republican?.

Lobbying run amok: Eight health care lobbyists for every member of Congress

President Obama will meet with 22 high-ranking lawmakers Thursday to discuss health care reform and how to accomplish it.

But if newly released information about lobbying in 2009 is any indication, the private sector and its interests may already be secured.

For every member of Congress, there were eight lobbyists working to influence health care reform last year, according to research by The Center for Public Integrity.

That’s about 4,525 total lobbyists from 1,750 companies that include 207 hospitals, 105 insurance companies and 85 manufacturing companies.

Full Story: Lobbying run amok: Eight health care lobbyists for every member of Congress | Raw Story.

The Democratic Party’s deceitful game

Democrats perpetrate the same scam over and over on their own supporters, and this illustrates perfectly how it’s played:

Politics Daily, October 4, 2009:

Jay Rockefeller on the Public Option: “I Will Not Relent”

Glenn Greenwald -

Jay Rockefeller has waited a long time for this moment. . . . He’s [] a longtime advocate of health care for children and the poor — and, as Congress moves toward its moment of truth on health care, perhaps the most earnest, dogged Senate champion of a nationwide public health insurance plan to compete with private insurance companies.

“I will not relent on that. That’s the only way to go,” Rockefeller told me in an interview. “There’s got to be a safe harbor.”

President Obama often says a public option is needed to drive down costs and keep insurance companies honest.  To Rockefeller, it’s both more basic and more vital:  The federal government is the only institution people can count on in times of need.

Full Story: - Salon.com.

‘Volcker Rule’ Stalls in Senate

Key senators are expected to scrap President Barack Obama’s proposal to prohibit commercial banks from certain risky trading activities, people familiar with the matter said, a setback for the administration’s bid to limit the size and scope of the largest U.S. banks.

The proposal, dubbed the “Volcker rule” after former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, would have essentially prevented any commercial bank with federally insured deposits from owning a division that makes speculative bets with its own capital.

But after resistance from lawmakers from both parties, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd (D., Conn.) and other legislators are expected to introduce a plan next week that would give regulators more discretion to limit and potentially ban risky trading at banks, especially if it poses a risk to the broader economy. The measure would stop short of banning such trading outright.

Full Story: ‘Volcker Rule’ Stalls in Senate – WSJ.com.

The Last Thing We Need is More Money for Prisons, But That Is What Obama Wants

At the same time the Obama administration is talking about a dramatic “spending freeze,” it’s requesting more money to lock people up.

At the same time the Obama administration is talking about a dramatic “spending freeze” on any and all projects unrelated to war-making, this is exactly what’s in store, it is quietly increasing the federal budget for even more prisons.

On February 1, Attorney General Eric Holder announced the administration would request $2.9 billion for the Department of Justice 2011 budget — “a 5.4 percent increase in budget authority,” according to the DOJ. Approximately $527.5 million would go to the federal Bureau of Prisons, a chunk of which would provide “bed space” to house prisoners currently at Guantanamo Bay (and ostensibly slated for transfer to the supermax prison in Thomson, IL).

“We have an obligation to protect our country in smart, reliable ways at every level,” Holder said, invoking both the “fight against global terrorism” as well as the need to enforce “civil rights and the rule of law.”

Full Story: The Last Thing We Need is More Money for Prisons, But That Is What Obama Wants | Civil Liberties | AlterNet.

Inside the Administration’s Deal with the Pharmaceutical Lobby

by Sebastian Jones, ProPublica –

Last August, the Los Angeles Times reported that a deal had been reached between the White House and the lobbying group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA). The pharmaceutical industry promised to deliver $80 billion in cost savings and to run television ads supporting the health care reform effort. In exchange, the White House would prevent Medicare renegotiation of drug prices and the re-importation of drugs from abroad.

Now, in a methodically researched report drawing on public records and press accounts, the Sunlight Foundation has gone back and forensically examined how the deal came to be.

To get a full picture of the interlocking interests at work, the full piece is worth a read. Here are a few of the key findings:

Full Story: On The Hill: Inside the Administration’s Deal with the Pharmaceutical Lobby.

Senate sitting on 290 bills already passed by House; tension mounts – TheHill.com

Exasperated House Democratic leaders have compiled a list showing that they have passed 290 bills that have stalled in the Senate.

The list is the latest sign that Democrats in the lower chamber are frustrated with their Senate counterparts.

An aide to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) says the list is put together during each Congress, but that this year’s number is likely the largest ever. However, he said Pelosi blames GOP senators, not Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) or Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.).

“The Speaker believes that the filibuster has its place, but clearly Senate Republicans are taking what was once a rare procedural move and abusing it to the detriment of progress for America’s working families,” said Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill.

But some House Democrats and their aides have shown no reticence in blaming Senate Democrats, who enjoyed a supermajority until Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) was sworn in earlier this month.

Full Story: Senate sitting on 290 bills already passed by House; tension mounts – TheHill.com.

OPS: Because Reid and Durbin are cowards.

VIDEO: Iraq for Sale

by Robert Greenwald -

The showing of this video was banned in the US Congress

On May 10th, 2007, this video was banned in Congress. Robert Greenwald, the director of IRAQ FOR SALE, was invited to testify before Congress by Rep. Jim Moran. He prepared four minutes from the documentary to show. Republicans insisted this not be shown.

Full Story: VIDEO: Iraq for Sale.

Obama Pressed to Release Identity of Telecom Lobbyists

Despite President Barack Obama’s pledge in the State of the Union address to “require lobbyists to disclose each contact they make on behalf of a client with my administration or Congress,” the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) says the Obama administration has been “fighting hard to stop the release of the names of these representatives.”

EFF urged, “While it’s great to see Obama reverse his position in the State of the Union and acknowledge the strong public interest in disclosure of lobbying records, the administration must do more than give speeches in order to fulfill its commitment to transparency.”

It said President Obama “must apply this policy to pending litigation, and release the identities of telecommunications representatives who lobbied for immunity for their telecommunications carrier clients.”

Full Story: t r u t h o u t | Obama Pressed to Release Identity of Telecom Lobbyists.

OPS: There should be a publicly available list of all lobbyists, who they represent, who they have contacted and how much they have spent, and who received it.

Campaign Contributions Up Five Percent In Fourth Quarter As Big Donors Beg For The Begging To Stop

Campaign contributions to members of the House of Representatives increased 5.4 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009, according to a preliminary analysis by the Center for Responsive Politics. Contributions to members of the Senate increased by 2 percent.

“The fact that the economy is pretty weak and fundraising seems to be robust may speak to the idea that 2010 will be a big year,” said CRP spokesman Dave Levinthal in an interview with HuffPost. “If you look at business, charitable giving — everything’s struggling, and politics doesn’t seem to be.”

House members raised $78 million in campaign contributions (which HuffPost commenters like to call “bribes”) in the last three months of the year, bringing the total for 2009 to $294 million, according to CRP. The average representative raked in $680,000. Senators raised $36 million in the fourth quarter, $152 million for the year. The average senator raised $1.6 million.

Full Story Campaign Contributions Up Five Percent In Fourth Quarter As Big Donors Beg For The Begging To Stop.

Evan Bayh Won’t Rule Out Becoming A Lobbyist After His Term Ends

A day after he announced his retirement from the U.S. Senate, Indiana Democrat Evan Bayh declined to rule out a career as a lobbyist.

“I have no idea what I’m doing next,” Bayh said in a statement to HuffPost. He would not elaborate further on his career plans when his term ends in 11 months.

Bayh offered a few clues about his next move in his retirement announcement on Monday: “At this time, I simply believe I can best contribute to society in another way: creating jobs by helping grow a business, helping guide an institution of higher learning, or helping run a worthy charitable endeavor.”

Full Story Evan Bayh Won’t Rule Out Becoming A Lobbyist After His Term Ends.

Most lawmakers haven’t returned donations from disgraced Texas banker Allen Stanford

Most lawmakers haven’t returned donations from disgraced Texas banker R. Allen Stanford despite pleadings from a federal receiver who is trying to get the money back for defrauded investors.

Dallas attorney Ralph Janvey is sending new letters this week demanding the funds from about 70 members of Congress, as well as the fundraising committees for Democrats and Republicans in the House and Senate. Janvey is seeking more than $1.8 million in contributions from Stanford, his top corporate lieutenants and employees of his offshore bank and affiliated financial services companies.

“The funds used to make these contributions came directly from defrauded investors,” said Kristie Blumenschein, a spokeswoman for Janvey. “Such payments were fraudulent transfers, and the receiver has requested that the funds be returned to the receivership estate as soon as possible.”

Full Story Most lawmakers haven’t returned donations from disgraced Texas banker Allen Stanford | News for Dallas, Texas | Dallas Morning News | Staff Writer Dave Michaels | Washington News | Dallas Morning News.

In a Message to Democrats, Wall St. Sends Cash to G.O.P

If the Democratic Party has a stronghold on Wall Street, it is JPMorgan Chase.

Its chief executive, Jamie Dimon, is a friend of President Obama’s from Chicago, a frequent White House guest and a big Democratic donor. Its vice chairman, William M. Daley, a former Clinton administration cabinet official and Obama transition adviser, comes from Chicago’s Democratic dynasty.

But this year Chase’s political action committee is sending the Democrats a pointed message. While it has contributed to some individual Democrats and state organizations, it has rebuffed solicitations from the national Democratic House and Senate campaign committees. Instead, it gave $30,000 to their Republican counterparts.

The shift reflects the hard political edge to the industry’s campaign to thwart Mr. Obama’s proposals for tighter financial regulations.

Full Story In a Message to Democrats, Wall St. Sends Cash to G.O.P. – NYTimes.com.

CEOs to Hill: Quit Calling Us for Campaign Cash

CEOs to Congress: Quit calling us for campaign cash, pass public financing

Dozens of current and former corporate executives have a message for Congress: Quit hitting us up for campaign cash.

Roughly 40 executives from companies including Playboy Enterprises, ice cream maker Ben & Jerry’s, the Seagram’s liquor company, toymaker Hasbro, Delta Airlines and Men’s Wearhouse sent a letter to congressional leaders Friday urging them to approve public financing for House and Senate campaigns. They say they are tired of getting fundraising calls from lawmakers — and fear it will only get worse after Thursday’s Supreme Court ruling.

The court ruled that corporations and unions can spend unlimited money on ads urging people to vote for or against candidates. The decision was sought by interest groups including one that represents American businesses, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. They argued that restrictions on ads they could finance close to elections violated their free-speech rights, and the court agreed.

Full Story CEOs to Hill: Quit Calling Us for Campaign Cash – ABC News.

Scott Lee Cohen: Could Illinois’ Lieutenant Governor Candidate Hamper Democrats’ Agenda in Elections?

Democratic Nominee for Lieutenant Governor, Scott Lee Cohen, Was Charged With Battery in 2005

The politics in President Obama’s home state of Illinois are once again in the spotlight for a scandal that seems ripped from the pages of a Hollywood script.

The Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor, Scott Lee Cohen, is butting heads with his fellow party members who are calling on him to resign amid reports that Cohen was arrested five years ago for allegedly assaulting his girlfriend.

Cohen, who won the Democratic primary by 26 percentage points Tuesday, is standing steadfast despite the controversy.

“I will not resign, I will not step down, I have done nothing wrong,” Cohen said.

Full Story Scott Lee Cohen: Could Illinois’ Lieutenant Governor Candidate Hamper Democrats’ Agenda in Elections? – ABC News.

OPS: I guess I don’t understand the process. How the Hell can the Democratic “leadership” (and I use the term loosely) ALLOW people like this to run as Democrats?  Is there No vetting process?  Anyone with the bucks that is willing to run as a Dem – and slips the “leadership” a few $$ – can run as a Democrat?  I guess this explains Blago and Bean too.  ‘This is suicidal.

Federal stimulus program pours $54 million into Wine Train project

A company won a $54 million contract to build new structures for the Napa Valley Wine Train tourist attraction. The result? 12 new jobs and “pork barrel” accusations.

NAPA – The corporate shareholders live in tribal villages in the outback of western Alaska.

The CEO is in South Carolina, where his prior multimillion-dollar venture – a dot-com for sail boaters – collapsed in bankruptcy.

But the main action today is in Napa, where, without competitive bidding, this unusual construction company won a $54 million federal contract to build a new railroad bridge and other structures for the famed Napa Valley Wine Train tourist attraction.

This is the world of Anchorage-based Suulutaaq Inc. Because the company was founded by Alaska natives, it enjoys special access to federal contracts.

Full Story Federal stimulus program pours $54 million into Wine Train project | California Watch.

John Boehner Complained To J.P. Morgan CEO About Donations

GOP Leader Tells Wall Street CEO: PAY US FOR OUR SERVICES!

The Wall Street Journal reports today that “Republicans are stepping up their campaign to win donations from Wall Street, trying to capitalize on an increasing sense of regret among executives at big financial institutions for backing Democrats in 2008.”

Despite a more favorable political environment than in 2008 and 2006, Republican congressional campaign committees are actually trailing their Democratic counterparts in fundraising totals heading into the 2010 campaign season.

As a result, GOP leaders are becoming increasingly aggressive about wooing major donations from the financial industry. The Journal reports:

Full Story John Boehner Complained To J.P. Morgan CEO About Donations.

Exclusive: How corporations secretly move millions to fund political ads

The Supreme Court’s seismic January ruling that corporations are free to spend unlimited amounts of their profits to advertise for or against candidates may have been the latest shakeup of campaign finance – but gaping holes already allow corporations to spend enormous sums without leaving a paper trail, a Raw Story investigation has found.

Campaign finance experts confirmed that though disclosure rules remained intact in the new Supreme Court decision, there are effective methods to circumvent them.

Ciara Torres-Spelliscy, an attorney and campaign finance expert at New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice, said corporations already effectively end-run campaign finance law by shuffling money through trade associations.

Full Story Exclusive: How corporations secretly move millions to fund political ads | Raw Story.

Obama Administration Knew Foreclosure Program Wasn’t Working Right, Did Nothing

Even as the Obama administration’s signature foreclosure-prevention program has foundered, Treasury Department officials have known that a key driver in keeping people in their homes in the long run is reducing mortgage principal, senior Treasury advisor Seth Wheeler told the Huffington Post. Wheeler is one of the architects of the administration’s housing plan.

But rather than pressure the mortgage companies to start reducing the amount mortgage-holders owe, the administration simply sat back and hoped servicers would do it on their own.

“When the administration came into office last year, from the get-go, it has certainly been aware of the link between negative equity and challenges in housing,” said Wheeler. “As the administration initially designed the modification program last year, it was aware of negative equity, was aware that some servicers were doing principal reductions.”

Full Story Obama Administration Knew Foreclosure Program Wasn’t Working Right, Did Nothing.

McConnell Raised Big Bucks From Foreign Defense Contractor Probed For Bribery

In the wake of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has been quick to denounce a bid by Democrats to stop foreign corporations from pouring money into U.S. elections, claiming current law already bars such spending. As we’ve reported before, it’s not nearly as simple as that — but McConnell should know: The GOP Senate leader has raked in campaign cash from a subsidiary of a major foreign defense contractor that’s currently being investigated by the Justice Department for bribery.

As we reported yesterday, McConnell, a longtime foe of efforts to get money out of politics, last week took to the Senate floor to pooh-pooh the notion that the court’s decision could allow a flood of foreign money to sway our elections, citing an existing law that prevents foreign nationals, including corporations, from spending on U.S. elections. But that ban doesn’t cover the U.S. subsidiaries of foreign companies, or to foreign-owned corporations that incorporate in the U.S.

That’s not just some technical loophole. Democrats and campaign-finance reform advocates argue it’s a very real weakness in the law, that, even before Citizens United, gave foreign corporations influence in our elections. And McConnell’s own ties to one foreign defense contractor offer a pretty good illustration.
Full Story McConnell Raised Big Bucks From Foreign Defense Contractor Probed For Bribery | TPMMuckraker.

Senate V. SCOTUS: Rules Committee Debates Measures to Stem the Coming Tide of Corporate Dollars in Political Campaigns

As Democrats scramble to assemble a slate of legislative and constitutional fixes to counter the effects of the Supreme Court decision, conservatives suggest Congress allow even more money to flow into campaigns.

With the president’s budget proposal and “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” occupying the time of C-SPAN crews in the capital today, there may have been a perception that campaign finance reform took its dutiful place at the back burner of American political consciousness at a hearing in the Senate Rules Committee Tuesday morning. But Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL) wasn’t about to let that assumption stand.

“I really think they show that they care when given a chance,” Durbin said of the American people. He countered the conventional wisdom that campaign finance reform is an “intramural issue.”

Of course, interest in Durbin’s long-time crusade for fair election financing (in the form of his Fair Elections Act) was helped along last month by a highly controversial decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that opened the floodgates, allowing corporations to spend virtually unlimited amounts of money on political campaigns.

Full Story Senate V. SCOTUS: Rules Committee Debates Measures to Stem the Coming Tide of Corporate Dollars in Political Campaigns | BuzzFlash.org.

Melissa Bean: A Democrat Bankers Bank On

Rep. Melissa Bean stands at the chokepoint of financial reform in the House of Representatives.

The Democrat from suburban Chicago is only in her third term, but she’s the co-chair of the 68-member New Democrat Coalition’s financial services task force — and financial reform doesn’t go anywhere in the House without the support of New Dems.

So when Democratic leaders in Congress want to rein in Wall Street, they have to go through Bean. And when bank lobbyists want to stop them, they go to Bean as well.

Why hasn’t the overwhelmingly Democratic House — and the House Financial Services Committee led by Barney Frank — been able to pass a more aggressive financial regulatory reform package? As HuffPost has reported, a significant obstacle to progressive reform is that Bean and 15 other New Dems on the committee have effective veto power.

Full Story Melissa Bean: A Democrat Bankers Bank On.

OPS: Corporate.  Bean is one of those Republicans pretending to be Democrat

Lobbyist charges $30,400 to ‘raise a glass’ with Pelosi

If you want to spend a couple hours hobnobbing with House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi, be prepared to pay up — way up.

Tony and Heather Podesta, two of Washington’s most prominent lobbyists, are inviting the Washington elite to a dinner party on Feb. 9 that will feature Pelosi, as well as a host of other Washington Democrats, including Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), Rep. Edolphus Towns (D-NY) and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chair Chris Van Hollen.

The price of admission? $5,000 for an individual, $15,000 for a representative of a political action committee, and $30,400 — the maximum allowable donation — for the privilege of being a co-host.

Read the admission form here.

Full Story Lobbyist charges $30,400 to ‘raise a glass’ with Pelosi | Raw Story.

After Obama rips lobbyists, K St. insiders get private briefings

A day after bashing lobbyists, President Barack Obama’s administration has invited K Street insiders to join private briefings on a range of topics addressed in Wednesday’s State of the Union.

The Treasury Department on Thursday morning invited selected individuals to “a series of conference calls with senior Obama administration officials to discuss key aspects of the State of the Union address.”

The invitation, which went to a variety of stakeholders, was sent by Fred Baldassaro, a senior adviser at the Treasury Department’s Office of Business Affairs and Public Liaison.

Full Story After Obama rips lobbyists, K St. insiders get private briefings – TheHill.com.

Elizabeth Warren: Obama Is Pushing Back Against Wall Street (VIDEO)

Financial reform advocate Elizabeth Warren appeared on The Rachel Maddow Show Thurday to discuss President Obama’s new proposals to rein in banks.

Warren, a Harvard professor and the chief of the TARP Congressional Oversight Panel, told Maddow that she’s encouraged not only by the new proposals to limit banks, but also by the president’s renewed commitment to an independent consumer financial protection agency. Warren:

“I feel better than I’ve felt in a long time. Because what I’ve heard the president saying on the Consumer Financial Protection Agency is, ‘It’s not going down. I’m here, I’m not giving up on it. There is not going to be a compromise to cave in on it.’ I heard him say that we’re going to tax those large financial institutions, and we’re going to make them pay back all of the money under TARP. And then today, I heard him say we’re gonna break apart too-big-to-fail. And we’re going to have an answer, so that every financial institution, if it makes big enough mistakes, if it takes big enough risks and loses, every one of them, can in the end, die…. And what I hear in that is that… the financial institutions have pushed him hard… [Obama] is pushing right back.”

Full Story Elizabeth Warren: Obama Is Pushing Back Against Wall Street (VIDEO).

Dodd Opposes Fed Audit

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd opposes including a provision to audit the Federal Reserve in the Senate’s regulatory reform package, the retiring Connecticut Democrat told the Huffington Post Thursday.

The measure made it into the House bill in November after an unusual insurgency led by Reps. Ron Paul (R-Texas) and Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) beat back a concerted effort by the Fed to kill the provision, and won an overwhelming and bipartisan vote in the House Financial Services Committee. It was an unprecedented legislative defeat for the Federal Reserve, which has never had a real audit in its history. Little is known of what it does with the trillions of dollars at its disposal.

And if Dodd has his way, it will stay that way.

“No, no,” Dodd said firmly of the audit requirement. “It’s not in the Senate bill.”

Full Story Dodd Opposes Fed Audit.

OPS: Just another rightwing  Corporatists proving that he is in the pocket of Wall Street. The Nation will be better off when he’s gone.

Blanche Lincoln Cosponsors Murkowski’s Dirty Air Act

Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) announced today she is co-sponsoring Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s (R-AK) resolution of disapproval to block regulation of greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act:

I am very concerned about the burden that EPA regulation of carbon emissions could put on our economy and have questions about the actual benefit EPA regulations would have on the environment. Heavy-handed EPA regulation, as well as the current cap and trade bills in Congress, will cost us jobs and put us at an even greater competitive disadvantage to China, India and others.

Like Murkowski and Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Lincoln is demonstrating a shocking disregard for her state’s interests, the health of her constituents, and a misunderstanding of why America has been losing jobs to China and India. Her support for the Dirty Air Act is an act of allegiance to polluters.

Full Story Wonk Room » Blanche Lincoln Cosponsors Murkowski’s Dirty Air Act.

Easily Hacked Diebold Systems to Decide ‘Toss-Up’ U.S. Senate Special Election in MA on Tuesday

Since writing today’s piece for Upstate New York’s right-leaning Gouverneur Times, a new poll has come out this morning showing the Republican Scott Brown now leading the Democrat Martha Coakley by 4 points in the race for the U.S. Senate seat formerly held by a Democrat named Kennedy for nearly 60 years.

As of last night, when I filed the story with them, the latest survey from a Democratic-leaning pollster showed Coakley up by 8, though a day or two earlier, Republican Rasmussen had Brown down only by 2 points.

Suffice to say it’s now officially “a toss-up”, at least according to the Rothenberg Political Report, and to all the Dems and Reps now sweating out what was previously thought to have been an easy Democratic win.

Full Story The BRAD BLOG : Easily Hacked Diebold Systems to Decide ‘Toss-Up’ U.S. Senate Special Election in MA on Tuesday.

Dodd may scrap consumer protection

Dodd Weighs Dropping Idea of Creating Independent Body in Bid to Get Financial Regulatory Revamp Passed This Year

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd is considering scrapping the idea of creating a Consumer Financial Protection Agency, people familiar with the matter said, an initiative at the heart of the White House’s proposal to revamp financial-sector regulations.

The Connecticut Democrat, who announced this month that he wouldn’t run for re-election this year, has discussed the possibility of abandoning the push for a new agency during negotiations with key Senate Republicans as a way to secure a bipartisan deal on the legislation, these people said.

Full Story Consumer Protection Agency in Doubt – WSJ.com.

OPS:  Politically he’s toast so he’ll be feathering his nest before he goes even more than usual

Stop the Chamber; I Want to Get Off! Group to Expose Candidates Accepting Funds From Commerce Lobbyists

It’s 2010. Do you know which corporate pocket your representative is in?

There is no better analogy for the outsize influence of corporations upon government than the behavior of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce of late. The “world’s largest business federation” has transformed itself into a lobbying machine for some of the nation’s dirtiest corporate crooks in a series of misleading campaigns against climate change legislation, affordable healthcare, the employee free choice act, campaign spending reform, corporate responsibility, consumer protection, and keeping social security private.

All the more reason to know who they’ve been wining and dining on the Hill.

Velvet Revolution, a nonprofit organization “dedicated to clean and honest government,” issued a statement today announcing they plan to target political candidates who accept contributions from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Full Story Stop the Chamber; I Want to Get Off! Group to Expose Candidates Accepting Funds From Commerce Lobbyists | BuzzFlash.org.

Lobbyists aided Alaska’s Murkowski in writing EPA limits bill

Two lobbyists had a hand in writing language proposed by Sen. Lisa Murkowski that could curtail the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate major emitters of greenhouse gases.

Their involvement, first reported Monday by The Washington Post, came at the request of a staffer on the Senate Energy and Environment Committee, where the Alaska senator is the top Republican. Both of the lobbyists, Jeff Holmstead and Roger Martella Jr., represent a number of high-profile energy clients. Both had top positions in the EPA during the Bush administration.

Murkowski has led the charge against the EPA's role in regulating greenhouse gas emissions, saying she has concerns about an executive branch agency, rather than Congress, writing such regulations. Her original amendment would have been attached to a spending bill and it would have prohibited the EPA for one year from spending any money on developing regulations for greenhouse gases

Full Story Lobbyists aided Alaska’s Murkowski in writing EPA limits bill | McClatchy.

Feingold wary of upcoming ruling on campaign finance

Supreme Court decision on case that challenges legislation expected soon

The court’s decision, which could come as early as this week, could have monumental consequences for the influence of corporate and union money on elections.

The case, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, centers on one of two primary provisions in the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act of 2002, commonly known as the McCain-Feingold bill after authors Feingold and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. The law banned ‘’soft” money, or large unregulated donations, and limited electioneering communications such as political advertising.

Citizens United, an independent group, has challenged an FEC ruling that prohibited the group from airing a documentary on 2008 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton titled “Hillary: The Movie.” The FEC said the group, which received corporate donations, could not run the documentary because it advocated the defeat of a political candidate within 60 days of a general election. The group had intended to air the documentary via a video-on-demand service.

Full Story Feingold wary of upcoming ruling on campaign finance | htrnews.com | Manitowoc Herald Times Reporter.

Obama received $20 million from healthcare industry in 2008 campaign

Almost three times the amount given to McCain

While some sunlight has been shed on the hefty sums shoveled into congressional campaign coffers in an effort to influence the Democrats’ massive healthcare bill, little attention has been focused on the far larger sums received by President Barack Obama while he was a candidate in 2008.

A new figure, based on an exclusive analysis created for Raw Story by the Center for Responsive Politics, shows that President Obama received a staggering $20,175,303 from the healthcare industry during the 2008 election cycle, nearly three times the amount of his presidential rival John McCain. McCain took in $7,758,289, the Center found.

The new figure, obtained by Raw Story through an independent custom research request performed by the Center for Responsive Politics — a nonprofit, nonpartisan group that tracks money in politics — is the most comprehensive breakdown yet available of healthcare industry contributions to Obama during the 2008 election cycle.

Full Story Obama received $20 million from healthcare industry in 2008 campaign | Raw Story.

Obama’s Big Sellout

Matt Taibbi & Robert F. Kennedy, Jr –

During his campaign, Barack Obama surrounded himself with progressive leaders who believed that we could prevent another economic crisis by enforcing tougher regulations for Wall Street. However, once he took office, he sent those progressives packing, and filled his cabinet with former Wall Street insiders who want to keep the system operating out of the scope of the government. This isn’t the “change” that we were expecting, and this is one of the reasons that the president is now facing an uphill battle to win back the votes of his base. Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. talks about the president’s sell out with Matt Taibbi, political correspondent for Rolling Stone magazine.

VIDEO: Obama’s Big Sellout – Matt Taibbi: Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3

Full Story Ring of Fire Radio | Obama’s Big Sellout – Matt Taibbi.

Drumbeat to Boot Geithner Gets Louder, on Eve of Hearings on Disastrous Economic Crash

Danny Schechter -

The Treasury Secretary’s pro-Wall Street policies, along with those of adviser Larry Summers, are failing. Time to give them the boot.

When a pitcher gets tired, starts throwing walks or being hit, most attentive managers take him out of the game. When policies break down, as in the case of the security system that failed to spot the alleged Christmas bomber, the president starts talking tough about the buck stopping here and orders to straighten out a failed system.

But when tens of thousands of workers, once again, lose their jobs, the people responsible get winked at, not wanked. The president is contrite, his rhetoric subdued, even as the recovery he keeps talking about goes south.

Yes, there needs to be a cabinet shake-up. It’s time to yank Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner from the game, along with economic adviser Larry Summers. Their pro-bank, pro-Wall Street policies are failing. Isn’t it obvious? According to an AP investigation, their road construction projects have had no impact on the jobs crisis.

Full Story Drumbeat to Boot Geithner Gets Louder, on Eve of Hearings on Disastrous Economic Crash | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet.

Stunning Comments from the White House on the Burgeoning Geithner/AIG Scandal

David Sirota  -

As a follow up to yesterday’s explosive news, check out today’s an amazing – and hideous – interchange between CNN reporter Ed Henry and White House press secretary Robert Gibbs about new evidence that Tim Geithner’s New York Fed instructed AIG to hide information from SEC regulators (by the way, big kudos to Henry for trying to get some answers):

Q: Robert, Does the White House believe that Secretary Geithner should testify on the Hill, turn over any documents he has, to sort of clear this up?

MR. GIBBS: Ed, I’d point you to the Treasury Department. I’m sure you’ve already talked to them. Secretary Geithner was not involved in any of these emails. These decisions did not rise to his level at the Fed. These are emails and decisions made by officials at an independent regulatory agency –

Q: But how do you know that he wasn’t involved? He was the leader of the New York Fed.

more…..

Three things here:

1. Notice that the White House is not denying that illegal action may have occurred – the administration is only making the (preposterous) assertion that the regulatory filings of the largest corporation in the New York Fed’s receivership somehow “didn’t rise” to Geithner’s level. That’s right, we’re expected to believe the decisions to authorize and then hide multi-billion-dollar taxpayer-financed sweetheart deals for Geithner’s friends at Goldman Sachs and all the other big banks obviously – obviously! – “didn’t rise” to Geithner’s level. Hmm…where have we heard this “no controlling legal authority” argument before…hmm…oh, right – from top Enron executives. And I thought the President was telling us that he believed in “buck stops here” accountability for those at the top, right? Guess not.

2. Gibbs insists Geithner “wasn’t….

Full Story Stunning Comments from the White House on the Burgeoning Geithner/AIG Scandal | The Smirking Chimp.

China learns to ‘work’ Capitol Hill

Ten years ago, U.S. lawmakers publicly accused the China Ocean Shipping Co. of being a front for espionage and blocked plans to expand its Long Beach, Calif., port terminal over fears that Chinese spies would use it to snoop on the United States.

By last year, Congress was seeing the state-owned Chinese behemoth in a far kinder light. Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) authored a resolution applauding the company for employing thousands of Americans and helping keep the waters of Alaska clean. Rep. Stephen F. Lynch (D-Mass.) hailed the firm on the House floor, calling its chief executive “a people's ambassador” to the United States after it rescued Boston's port — and thousands of jobs — when a European shipping line moved out.

The congressional about-face illustrates a dramatic increase in China's influence on Capitol Hill, where for years its lobbying muscle never matched its ballooning importance in world affairs. Members of Congress, lobbyists and other observers said China's new prominence is largely the result of Beijing's increasingly sophisticated efforts to influence events at the center of U.S. power — and a growing realization among U.S. lawmakers that China has become a critical economic player across America.

Full Story China learns to ‘work’ Capitol Hill – Washington Post- msnbc.com.

Roy Sekoff On AIG-Fed Emails: This Has Got To Be The End Of Tim Geithner (VIDEO)

HuffPost Editor Roy Sekoff appeared on The Ed Show Thursday to weigh in on news that Tim Geithner and the New York Fed actively worked to keep details of bailed out insurer AIG’s payments to Wll Street banks hidden from the public–even though it was taxpayer money that was being used.

Sekoff contends that this is just more evidence that the government has become “Of the bankers, for the bankers, and by the bankers.”

“The fix is in,” he said.

WATCH

Full Story Huff TV: Roy Sekoff On AIG-Fed Emails: This Has Got To Be The End Of Tim Geithner (VIDEO).

Are Republicans political terrorists?

It didn’t take the Republicans long, less than 24 hours after the foiled bomb attempt on flight 253, to start pointing fingers and trying to make the claim that we are less safe now than under the Republicans because of the approach or policy of the Obama Administration. Part of that approach was Obama waiting four days before making a public statement so it seems the party of “personal responsibility” seems to need a daddy to tell them everything is ok.

What the Republicans are too dishonest to say, is that we were hit on 911 and saw 3000 people killed, preciselybecause of the Republican approach and policy on terrorism, Republican bungling, Republican incompetence and Republican ideology.

This was proved during the 911 Commission Hearings which presented irrefutable evidence that 911 could have been prevented except for the gross negligence, incompetence, and conservative idelology of the Bush Administration who didn’t take terrorism seriously until it was too late.

Full Story Are Republicans political terrorists?.

How To Get Rich on the Financial Services Committee

When House leadership was handing out committee assignments to the freshmen class of 2008, in the midst of one of the biggest financial crises to ever rock the country, it was decided that the best thing to do was put new members who needed campaign cash for tough 2010 battles on the Financial Services Committee.

And so 11 freshmen members from conservative leaning districts were assigned to the committee, basically setting them up to be “bribed” by Wall Street.

Ryan Grim and Arthur Delaney deserve huge kudos for this piece, which outstrips any coverage I’ve seen in the financial press this year and gets to the heart of darkness as to why the banks continue unregulated.

Here’s a microcosmic view of the problem:

Full Story FDL Action » How To Get Rich on the Financial Services Committee.

Latest Public Option Concession Comes Into Focus

With several prominent House Democrats acknowledging that they will likely have to give up a public option for insurance coverage in health care reform negotiations with the Senate, the focus has shifted to what concessions they can extract in return.

The main issue on the radar is to try and ensure that newly created health insurance exchanges are national (the House version) and not state-based (the Senate version), say sources on and off the Hill.

“That’s where people are going to be looking,” said Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) when asked if this would be the key compromise if the public option is dropped. “I’m going to give you my own view, which is the House view, which is that I think we need a federal insurance exchange…. I think we’ve got to look closely at this. I think that it’s much easier… to keep insurance companies in check — it is simpler to administer. We’re going to have a checkerboard here [with the Senate bill]. And also I think you have to take a look at the political reality. Implementing reform is going to be much more difficult in some states than in others.”

Full Story Latest Public Option Concession Comes Into Focus.

The Cash Committee: How Wall Street Wins On The Hill

The question was simple: Should the lending practices of auto dealers be regulated?

It was already October and the 42 Democrats and 29 Republicans on the House Committee on Financial Services had spent the better part of the year hashing out the details of a new federal agency dedicated to protecting consumers from dangerous and deceptive financial products.

Auto dealers seemed like an obvious target for the new agency; nearly every time someone buys a car, the dealer also sells them an auto loan, complete with promises like zero per cent interest and a pile of cash back. Americans hold some $850 billion in car debt and dealers are responsible for marketing roughly four-fifths of that amount. They pocket lucrative commissions with little oversight, and the committee seemed poised to change that.

Full Story The Cash Committee: How Wall Street Wins On The Hill.

Rahm Emanuel, Corporatist for Hire: Part of the Revolving Door Between D.C. and Millions in Financial World

In case you missed it over the holidays, there’s been a fair amount of internecine conflict over FireDogLake.com founder Jane Hamsher’s decision to target White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel’s supposed misdeeds on the board of the troubled semi-governmental lending entity known as Freddie Mac in the early part of this fading decade.

Some of the uproar clearly comes from the way Hamsher decided to do it. Teaming up with the notoriously conservative Grover Norquist to sign a letter calling for the attorney general to investigate and for Emanuel to resign easily evokes the term “strange bedfellows,” and mistrust along with it.

FiveThirtyEight.com founder Nate Silver wrote that he found the “conspiracy theory” to be “bizarre.” The New York Times’ Caucus Blog seemed to roll its collective eye at Hamsher’s “viewing [Emanuel] as a sort of presidential puppet-master.”

Personally, I can’t say if Emanuel had anything to do with the stripping of Acting Inspector General Ed Kelly’s authority to investigate the apparent crimes of Freddie Mac, though I find it marginally more convincing than the funnel a “trillion-dollar slush fund into corruption-riddled companies with no oversight in place.” More troubling to me is Hamsher’s childish and short-sighted oversimplification of the healthcare reform process as a way to further her vendetta against Emanuel.

Full Story Rahm Emanuel, Corporatist for Hire: Part of the Revolving Door Between D.C. and Millions in Financial World | BuzzFlash.org.

Dennis Hastert: A Portrait of a Political System Termite

Sibel Edmond -

The Erosion & Rotting of a Nation’s Foundation

While dictionaries and encyclopedias, including Wikipedia, provide a thorough definition and description of insect termites, none offers any information on the semi-human termites imbedded within the political system of our nation, where they feed on the lobby and special interest Political Eco System while they cause serious foundational and structural damage to the welfare of the public majority, and to future generations’ prosperity and liberties. These Political System Termites (PST) and their colonies exist and thrive within various branches and layers of the political governing system, and they go by different names or titles, including Representative, Senator, Secretary, and Advisor. Regardless of title differences and purely cosmetic differentiations and technicalities, they belong to the same political eco system and all are considered members of the PST family. This article will focus mainly on Congressional Termites.

Let’s start by comparing some general overlapping characteristics between the widely acknowledged and recognized insect termites and the still-waiting-to-be recognized and defined Political System Termites (PST):

Insect termites divide labor among gender lines, produce overlapping generations and take care of their young collectively. Political System Termites divide their activities based on a corruption hierarchy, create networks of laws and legislations to protect themselves and the establishment, and protect one another collectively, including their retired then turned lobbyist seniors – regardless of cosmetic brand differentiations, such as ‘D’ or ‘R.’

Full Story Sibel Edmonds’ Boiling Frogs Post | Home of the Irate Minority.

Risky Lenders Did More Aggressive Lobbying: IMF Report

Over the last few few decades, financial lobbying yielded an incredible return on investment for Wall Street — albeit, in the form of taxpayer bailouts, notes Barry Ritholtz.

It should come as no surprise then, that according to a new report from the IMF, lenders that did the most aggressive lobbying also engaged in the most risky loans.

Excessive risk, in other words, is correlated with campaign cash and lobbying money. Banks and corporations which committed millions to lobbying, the report rather timidly suggests, may have received “preferential treatment” and influenced policy decisions.

Here’s the IMF’s “A Fistful of Dollars: Lobbying and the Financial Crisis”:

Full Story Risky Lenders Did More Aggressive Lobbying: IMF Report.

Feds probe banker Allen Stanford’s ties to Congress

The ties between indicted banker Allen Stanford and members of Congress — including millions in contributions and weekends in five-star Caribbean resorts — are now the subject of a sweeping federal investigation.

Just hours after federal agents charged banker Allen Stanford with fleecing investors of $7 billion, the disgraced financier received a message from one of Congress’ most powerful members, Pete Sessions.

“I love you and believe in you,” said the e-mail sent on Feb. 17. “If you want my ear/voice — e-mail,” it said, signed “Pete.”

The message from the chair of the National Republican Congressional Committee represents one of the many ties between members of Congress and the indicted banker that have caught the attention of federal agents.

The Justice Department is investigating millions of dollars Stanford and his staff contributed to lawmakers over the past decade to determine if the banker received special favors from politicians while building his spectacular offshore bank in Antigua, The Miami Herald has learned.

Agents are examining campaign dollars, as well as lavish Caribbean trips funded by Stanford for politicians and their spouses, feting them with lobster dinners and caviar.

The money Stanford gave Sessions and other lawmakers was stolen from his clients while he carried out what prosecutors now say was one of the nation’s largest Ponzi schemes.

Full Story Feds probe banker Allen Stanford’s ties to Congress – Front Page – MiamiHerald.com.

Pork greased reform’s passage

The multimillion-dollar deals cut with Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) and others to win the 60 votes needed for the historic health care reform bill gave President Barack Obama the margin he needed to fulfill a central campaign promise — but may also have upped the ante for future presidential horse trading.

With the bill hanging in the balance, Nelson won a provision exempting his state from paying the usual share of costs for new Medicaid patients. The deal critics have dubbed the Cornhusker Kickback is expected to cost the federal government $100 million over 10 years.

Before a close vote last month, Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) won an even larger break for her state — an estimated $300 million in extra federal spending, in a move opponents derided as the Louisiana Purchase.

Some critics branded the special deals as functionally equivalent to the kind of earmarks Obama crusaded against as a senator — and a quantum leap from eleventh-hour deals Obama’s predecessors have cut.

Full Story Pork greased reform’s passage – POLITICO.com Print View.

On health-care bill, Democratic senators are in states of denial

Formally, it is known as H.R. 3590, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. But this week, it has acquired an unhelpful nickname: “Cash for Cloture.”

As Senate Democrats finally complete their health-care legislation, those combing through the bill have uncovered many backroom deals that were made to buy, er, secure the 60 votes needed to “invoke cloture” — the legislative term for cutting off debate and holding a final vote.

It will take years to see how well the measure reduces costs and expands insurance coverage. But already, the bill has been a bonanza for wordsmiths.

First there was the “Louisiana Purchase,” $100 million in extra Medicaid money for the Bayou State, requested by Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.).

Then came the “Cornhusker Kickback,” another $100 million in extra Medicaid money, this time for Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.).

Full Story On health-care bill, Democratic senators are in states of denial – washingtonpost.com.

How Wall Street Bought Barney Frank

Barney Frank takes pride in being the Left’s darling, but he’s almost entirely funded by Wall Street and his votes show it.

Few members of Congress are considered more liberal than Barney Frank. Gay, left-handed, and Jewish, as his biography’s title proudly proclaims, he clearly enjoys living in direct contravention of right-wing ideals.

A favorite conservative punching bag, Glenn Beck and Bill O’Reilly have their tea party base convinced that it was actually Frank who sent the country into an economic tailspin, through some curious combination of incompetence, redistributive zeal, greed, and homosexuality. Beck’s conspiratorial chalkboards link Frank to the mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, back to the community organization ACORN, and by implication, to the poor and undeserving. Naturally, liberals have responded by closing ranks around the congressman.

The pseudo-research of Fox News and friends, and their obsession with Fannie and Freddie – hardly the root of all economic troubles – have distracted from a core reality of Frank’s recent career in Congress. Since becoming the ranking Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee seven years ago, he has built a formidable Wall Street donor base, even by Washington’s standards; as the housing bubble grew, so too did his fundraising purse and his stature, in Congress and beyond.

Full Story How Wall Street Bought Barney Frank | Politics | AlterNet.

White House Drug Importation/PhRMA Deal Scandal Thickens with New Contradictions…

David Sirota:

TPM has a new story up about the now-thickening drug importation scandal – and the explanations are starting to get more and more convoluted and contradictory as the White House works to fight off the accusation that its political staff actually wrote an FDA safety-warning letter:

Hearing rumors of an FDA letter opposing his amendment last week, Dorgan called Hamburg to inquire about that matter. She told him that she didn’t know of any letter. Then, just 24 hours later, on Dec. 8, the letter went out, signed by Hamburg…

Asked about Dorgan’s timeline by TPMmuckraker, FDA spokesperson Meghan Scott did not say it was inaccurate. “The Commissioner did speak to Sen. Dorgan in the days before the letter was sent,” Scott says. “On that call, she expressed the FDA’s concerns, but at the time, no decision had been made on whether or not to send a letter.”

Scott adds that the letter was sent in response to an inquiry by Sens. Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Tom Carper (D-DE). And she argues that the letter is consistent with the FDA’s past position on drug importation.

First the contradiction: According to this report and the Wall Street Journal report, FDA Commissioner Hamburg “didn’t know of any letter.” The FDA spokesperson does not deny this – but suggests that when Dorgan talked to the FDA Commissioner a letter was under consideration. Notice the phrase “at the time, no decision had been made on whether or not to send a letter” – the idea being that there was the possibility of a letter, it was just under consideration.

Full Story White House Drug Importation/PhRMA Deal Scandal Thickens with New Contradictions… | The Smirking Chimp.

Congress to probe ‘US funding of Taliban’

US may be ‘unintentionally involved in vast protection racket’: Tierney

Troop surge could backfire if it means more cash for insurgents

A House committee has launched an investigation into claims that US military contractors in Afghanistan are paying the Taliban to guarantee the safety of their transportation convoys, an allegation that could mean American taxpayers are indirectly funding the insurgency that has killed more than 900 American soldiers so far.

“Serious allegations have been [made] that private security providers for US transportation contractors in Afghanistan are regularly paying local warlords and the Taliban for security,” said Rep. John Tierney (D-MA), chairman of the Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs. “After a preliminary inquiry, it has been determined these reports warrant a full-scale subcommittee investigation.”

Tierney said that if the allegations are proven to be true, “it would mean that the United States is unintentionally engaged in a vast protection racket and, as such, may be indirectly funding the very insurgents we are trying to fight.”

Full Story Congress to probe ‘US funding of Taliban’ | Raw Story.

OPS:  “unintentionally” ?  Hmmmm…….  Bush let bin Laden get away twice, US funded the Taliban against the Soviets….

Angry Liberals: Why Didn’t Obama Fight?

More than anything else in Barack Obama’s presidency so far, health reform has exposed a get-a-deal-at-any-cost side of Obama that infuriates his party’s progressives.

And as Democrats tried to salvage health reform Tuesday, some liberals could barely hide their sense of betrayal that the White House and congressional Democrats have been willing to cut deals and water down what they consider the ideal vision of reform.

“The Senate version is not worth passing,” former Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean told POLITICO, referring to plans to strip the latest compromise from the bill, a Medicare buy-in. “I think in this particular iteration, this is the end of the road for reform.”

Dean said there are some good elements in the bill, but lawmakers should pull the plug and revisit the issue in Obama’s second term, unless Democrats are willing to shortcut a GOP filibuster. “No one will think this is health care reform. This is not even insurance reform,” he said.

Full Story Angry Liberals: Why Didn’t Obama Fight? | CommonDreams.org.

OPS: Answer:  because Obama made his Faustian deal with the Corporations months ago.  Everything that has happend since has been staged, Kabuki for the peons. The terrible bill, as it now stands, is the bill he wants and the deal he made.

Congress Ethics Rules Undermined by Weasels

Jim Hightower –

Scientifically speaking, the weasel is in the mustelidae family, but it is not the only burrowing rodent of its genus. There’s also the mustela congressa lobbyista, which is that mischievous grouping of Washington lobbyists who habitually team up with certain congress-critters to burrow loopholes in our country’s ethics laws.

You might recall the big ethics reform push of 2007. In January of that year, in response to public outrage over breathtakingly flagrant scandals involving Uber-lobbyist Jack Abramoff and several Republican members of Congress, the new Democratic majority in the U.S. House pushed through a widely ballyhooed set of reforms. Incoming Speaker Nancy Pelosi promised that the changes would deliver “the most honest, ethical and open Congress in history.

How’d that work out?

Well, the new rules certainly have been an improvement over the anything-goes, corporate lobbyfest of the George W. Bush years. But even as the reforms were being written, mustela congressa lobbyista was busily burrowing its way into the new majority, inserting weaselly language that lets lobbyists continue slipping corporate money to lawmakers. Both ingenious and insidious, the loopholes allow business-as-usual collusion between influence-peddlers and those members of Congress who seem to be incurably allergic to ethics.

Full Story t r u t h o u t | Jim Hightower | Congress Ethics Rules Undermined by Weasels.

Bank Lobbyists Launch ‘Call To Action’ To Crush Financial Reform (MEMO)

The American Bankers Association issued a “Call to Action” on Wednesday, urging its lobbyists and member banks to make an all-out effort to crush regulatory reform in Senate. As part of that campaign, it lashed out at its community-bank rival, charging it with being too soft on bank reform efforts.

In an unusually frank memo from ABA Chairman Art Johnson, the lobby group congratulates bankers for sending some 300,000 letters to Congress opposing reform, crediting the effort with killing several significant provisions.

And it takes aim at the Independent Community Bankers Association, which endorsed the final bank-reform bill to make its way through the House last Friday.

“To be successful in the Senate, we must have a united message. And that is why I am truly saddened by what I am about to report to you. I do this not to cast blame, but in the hope we can fix this and be united as we go to the Senate,” said Johnson.

Full Story Bank Lobbyists Launch ‘Call To Action’ To Crush Financial Reform (MEMO).

Hadassah Lieberman under attack over industry ties

Sen. Joe Lieberman – whose opposition to a public insurance option has drawn outrage from liberal groups for months – is used to finding himself in progressive crosshairs.

Now it’s his wife’s turn.

Activists are setting their sights on Hadassah Lieberman, launching a celebrity-studded petition drive to convince the nation’s largest breast cancer non-profit to end the Connecticut senator’s wife role as a spokeswoman.

The move to pressure the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation came the same day Lieberman’s husband angered Democrats by announcing that he would not support an expansion of Medicare to cover individuals under the age of 55. Organizers did not point to that decision, instead citing Hadassah Lieberman’s own ties to the health care industry.

Lieberman has worked as a consultant for companies including Pfizer and ALCO.

Full Story CNN Political Ticker: All politics, all the time Blog Archive – Hadassah Lieberman under attack over industry ties « – Blogs from CNN.com.

Lieberman cites Finance Committee bill he opposed to justify Medicare flip-flop.

After Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) let it be known that he would filibuster a health care reform bill with Medicare buy-in, many bloggers, including ThinkProgress, pointed out that he campaigned in favor of such a proposal in 2000 and reiterated that support just three months ago. In an effort to explain the flip-flop, Lieberman spokesperson Erika Masonhall told the Daily Beast that Lieberman changed his position after the health care reform bill reported out of the Senate Finance Committee “contained extensive health insurance reforms” that “would benefit” those between 55 and 64 who would be eligible for the buy-in. Masonhall says extending Medicare would thus be “duplicative”:

Masonhall explained to The Daily Beast via e-mail. “Senator Lieberman’s comment reported by the Connecticut Post in September was made before the Finance Committee reported out the Baucus bill, which contained extensive health insurance reforms, including a more narrow age rating for pricing health insurance premiums and extensive affordability credits that would benefit this specific group of individuals. These health insurance reforms and affordability credits have been strengthened in Senator Reid’s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and will provide even greater relief for those 55-65 years old. Any inclusion of a Medicare buy-in for that same age group would be duplicative of what is already in the bill, would put the government on the hook for billions of additional dollars, and would potentially threaten the solvency of Medicare, which is already in a perilous state.

Full Story Think Progress » Lieberman cites Finance Committee bill he opposed to justify Medicare flip-flop..

Lieberman Wins: Medicare Compromise On Chopping Block

Joe Lieberman has forced his will on the Senate Democratic caucus and the nation as a whole. After the party reached a compromise last week to effectively drop the public option in exchange for allowing 55- to 64-year-olds to buy into Medicare, that compromise is now in doubt.

Lieberman, an independent from Connecticut, told Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Sunday that he will block any bill that includes the buy-in. As the 60th vote needed to overcome a Republican filibuster, he can do that.

Following a caucus-wide meeting Monday evening, the measure was all but scuttled.

“It’s looking like that’s the case. I can’t guarantee it. At this point, at this stage, that seemed to be the case,” acknowledged Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.). Asked why it had been dropped, he said, “I didn’t confirm that now. It’s just a matter of getting support from 60 senators.”

Full Story Lieberman Wins: Medicare Compromise On Chopping Block.

Max Baucus gave girlfriend $14K raise

Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, gave a nearly $14,000 pay raise to a female staffer in 2008, at the time he was becoming romantically involved with her, and later that year took her on a taxpayer-funded trip to Southeast Asia and the Middle East, though foreign policy was not her specialty.

Late last Friday, Baucus acknowledged his relationship with Melodee Hanes, whom he nominated for the job of U.S. attorney in Montana, after it was first reported on the website MainJustice.com. But he said that Hanes withdrew from consideration for the job when the relationship became more serious. The next day, he dismissed calls for an ethics investigation, saying, “I went out of my way to be up and up.”

Since his announcement, more details of the relationship have emerged, raising questions about a workplace romance between a boss and employee that Baucus tried to keep quiet and also contradicting his explanation for why Hanes’s nomination was withdrawn.

Full Story Max Baucus gave girlfriend $14K raise – - POLITICO.com.

Sen. Grassley Spreads Lies On Comparative Effectiveness Research – video

Media Matters –

During a December 6, 2009 floor speech during the debate over health care reform, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) repeated a slew of falsehoods surrounding comparative effectiveness research.

Sen. Chuck Grassley:

The federal government will have a newly created comparative effectiveness research program. This program would be similar to the ones in Great Britain and other foreign governments that decide which treatments [sic] can and cannot have. Now I want everyone to understand that the principle of comparative effectiveness research in and of itself is not something that I oppose because I think when it’s used as a way of informing patients and providers about best practices, it’s a good thing to have. But I’m also worried this research could be used as a tool for government to ration care. [Grassley Floor Statement, 12/6/09]

The Federal CER Board Will NOT Make Recommendations

CER Council “Will Not Recommend Clinical Guidelines.” The published guidelines for the Federal Coordinating Council are very clear about the decisions its members will make: The Federal Coordinating Council For Comparative Effectiveness Research “will not recommend clinical guidelines for payment, coverage or treatment.” [HHS.gov, 3/19/09, emphasis added]

Full Story Sen. Grassley Spreads Lies On Comparative Effectiveness Research | Media Matters Action Network.

Democrats To Revise Presidential Primary Rules

The presidential primary process is flawed and needs to be fixed, the Democratic National Committee says. A committee has issued recommendations that de-emphasize the importance given to early contests like Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, and South Carolina, and the outsized influence of the superdelegates.

These problems clearly manifested themselves in the 2008 election. As states jockey for position, the primary season has been steadily extended — the 2008 Iowa caucuses took place on January 3, two weeks earlier than in 2004 — and Michigan and Florida touched off a heated fight withing the Democratic party by moving up their primaries.

As House Majority Whip James Clyburn told CNN: “We need to improve a little bit in spite of the fact that we got a great candidate out of the process. It was not very comfortable at various points along the way.”

The consequences could have been catastrophic for the Democrats, Chris Good writes at The Atlantic:

Full Story Democrats To Revise Presidential Primary Rules.

Baucus nominated girlfriend to be US attorney

Senate Finance Committee Chairman was romantically involved with a former staffer when he recommended her earlier this year to become the next U.S. attorney for Montana, a spokesman said.

The Montana Democrat and his former state office director Melodee Hanes began their relationship in the summer of 2008 after Baucus separated from his wife, Ty Matsdorf told The Associated Press late Friday.

Baucus nominated Hanes for the U.S. attorney post in March. But she later withdrew, saying she had been presented with other opportunities she couldn’t pass up.

Full Story Baucus nominated girlfriend to be US attorney | Raw Story.

Senate Bill Contains A Gift For Big Banks

Despite bipartisan consensus on Capitol Hill that the size and interconnectedness of major financial institutions poses a grave risk to the system as a whole, Senate banking reform legislation includes a provision that will help them get even bigger.

The provision — long desired by the big banks — would allow them to open new branches in states regardless of local laws. This is known as de novo branching. The provision was first put forward by the Treasury Department in the financial regulation reform bill that it sent to Congress.

House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) initially included the provision in his bill, but removed it after a Democratic committee member, Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida, asked that it be taken out.

Florida doesn’t allow de novo branching and its local banks are vocal opponents of changing the law. They went to Grayson, and Grayson took their concerns to Frank, who said he had no problem removing it.

Full Story Senate Bill Contains A Gift For Big Banks.

A Special Message to Joe Lieberman from His Roommate at Yale

By David Wyles

Over the past few years, we have published appeals to Joe Lieberman by his Yale undergraduate roommate, David Wyles. Today, we are posting David’s holiday message to the man who you never want to get in between him and a camera: Joe Lieberman.

I was Joe Lieberman’s friend and roommate for all four years at Yale. I supported him personally and politically (helping him to be elected as Chairman of the Yale Daily News, then the most prominent and powerful political position at Yale). We had a number of truly talented people at the News (like Paul Steiger, later to be managing editor of the Wall Street Journal, Bob Kaiser, associate editor of the Washington Post, and John Sacks, chief correspondent for Time magazine), but Joe won the job because he appealed to all factions within the News. Basically, he won the political vote among these factions because he appeared to listen and agree with all of them. He was a “natural” — so obviously good at politics that I predicted while we were still undergraduates at Yale that he would be the first Jewish President of the United States.

Thank God I was wrong. (Although if Gore had been elected, we probably wouldn’t have preemptively invaded Iraq.) When Joe sold out Gore and the Democratic Party in Florida after the 2000 election (blessing all military votes without regard to proper electoral procedures), I lost faith in him. Since then, he has proven himself to be a sell-out to the Bush Administration’s War on Iraq, to the Bush nominations of reactionary justices to the Supreme Court (where were his threats of filibuster then?), and now to the fiscal interests of Big Pharma and Big Insurance. He is a wholly owned subsidiary of Aetna and Pfister. He no longer cares about what’s good for the American people. He has clearly sold his soul to the Dark Side of capitalism.

Full Story A Special Message to Joe Lieberman from His Roommate at Yale | BuzzFlash.org.

New Obama policy bars lobbyists from federal advisory panels

Hundreds, if not thousands, of lobbyists are likely to be ejected from federal advisory panels as part of a little-noticed initiative by the Obama administration to curb K Street’s influence in Washington, according to White House officials and lobbying experts.

The new policy — issued with little fanfare this fall by the White House ethics counsel — may turn out to be the most far-reaching lobbying rule change so far from President Obama, who also has sought to restrict the ability of lobbyists to get jobs in his administration and to negotiate over stimulus contracts.

The initiative is aimed at a system of advisory committees so vast that federal officials don’t have exact numbers for its size; the most recent estimates tally nearly 1,000 panels with total membership exceeding 60,000 people.

Under the policy, which is being phased in over the coming months, none of the more than 13,000 lobbyists in Washington would be able to hold seats on the committees, which advise agencies on trade rules, troop levels, environmental regulations, consumer protections and thousands of other government policies.

“Some folks have developed a comfortable Beltway perch sitting on these boards while at the same time working as lobbyists to influence the government,” said White House ethics counsel Norm Eisen, who disclosed the policy in a September blog posting on the White House Web site. “That is just the kind of special interest access that the president objects to.”

But lobbyists and many of the businesses they represent say K Street is being unfairly demonized by a White House intent on scoring political points with scandal-weary voters. They warn that the latest policy will severely handicap federal regulators, who rely heavily on advisory boards for technical advice and to serve as liaisons between government and industry.

“It’s taken me years to learn what the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade is,” said Robert Vastine, a lobbyist for the Coalition of Service Industries who also serves as chairman of a trade advisory board. “It’s a whole different and specialized world. It is not easily obtained knowledge, and they are crippling themselves terribly by ruling out all registered lobbyists.”

Full Story New Obama policy bars lobbyists from federal advisory panels.

OPS:  We’ll see. Is he really banning them, or just replacing the old ones with new ones?

White House’s Ties to Health Care Industry Deeper Than Visitor Records Show | Politics | AlterNet

The White House released records cataloguing 575 visits by health care industry heavyweights since Jan. 20. The ties run deep.

In August, the Associated Press asked the Obama White House — which has promised to be the most transparent administration 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue has ever seen — to release information on all communications between top staff and health care industry bigwigs. The call went unanswered, so in September the AP downgraded its request to a log of health care-related visits to those same top White House officials.

On Wednesday, the White House released records of 575 such visits since Jan. 20. It catalogs meetings with 22 top Obama aides including chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and senior advisers Valerie Jarrett, David Axelrod, and Pete Rouse.

The list of White House guests is a real who’s-who of the health care industry. It includes Billy Tauzin, chief of PhRma, the drug industry lobby; Scott Serota, president and CEO of Blue Cross and Blue Shield; and lobbyists from the Business Roundtable, an organization representing the policy interests of head honchos at major U.S. companies.

The AP detailed a few of the hundreds of health care meetings, and from that sampling, I figured we might find some interesting connections — this being Washington, D.C. — between the visitors and the White House staffers they met with. In order to more effectively analyze the ties between the people and organizations represented at these meetings, AlterNet enlisted the research skills of Kevin Connor, co-founder of LittleSis.org, a watchdog site self-styled as an “involuntary facebook for powerful people.”

Full Story White House’s Ties to Health Care Industry Deeper Than Visitor Records Show | Politics | AlterNet.

How Tom Daschle Lobbies In Secret: Influence Laundering

Former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle will soon move from one big lobbying firm to another even bigger lobbying firm. It’s a career boost for a first-rate K Street powerbroker — just don’t call him a lobbyist.

Lobbyists, after all, are required to register with Congress and file quarterly reports disclosing their actions on behalf of clients. The South Dakota Democrat, like a growing number of people in his line of work, has made sure he doesn’t have to do that.

“I’ve not made a call nor made a visit since I left the Senate on behalf of a client. And I don’t have any expectation that I’ll do that in the future,” Daschle told the New York Times recently.

By claiming that he never picks up the phone on his clients’ behalf, Daschle is not legally obliged to declare himself a lobbyist, even if all his work for those clients falls under the general definition of “lobbying activity.” That means he can keep his clients’ identities and how much they pay him entirely secret.

Full Story How Tom Daschle Lobbies In Secret: Influence Laundering.

Rise in stock ownership among lawmakers brings ethics concerns

As stock ownership rises in Congress, experts warn of potential ethics concerns

When Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) this summer proposed a $4 billion tax on medical-device firms to help offset the cost of health-care reforms, an unusual mix of lawmakers joined in a chorus of protest.

Full Story Rise in stock ownership among lawmakers brings ethics concerns – washingtonpost.com.

CREW Files FEC Complaint Over Landrieu’s $23,500 ‘Donation’ To The U.S. Treasury

The watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has filed a formal complaint with the Federal Election Commision over a mysterious $25,300 “donation” to the U.S. Treasury by Senator Mary Landrieu’s campaign committee. The Louisiana Democrat’s campaign made no announcement when it donated the funds in August 2008.

“We all know politicians don’t give up campaign contributions — much less $25,000 — without a very good reason,” said CREW executive director Melanie Sloan in a statement. “It appears Sen. Landrieu’s reason may have been to avoid a scandal or, even worse, a federal investigation into some of her contributions.”

Marc Elias, a lawyer for Landrieu’s campaign, wrote in an e-mail to the Huffington Post: “This is a silly complaint. Unfortunately FEC rules don’t prevent frivolous complaints; nonetheless, it will ultimately be dismissed.”

Full Story CREW Files FEC Complaint Over Landrieu’s $23,500 ‘Donation’ To The U.S. Treasury.

The 15 Biggest Congressional Recipients Of Wall Street Campaign Cash

Reforming Wall Street is a hot topic on Capitol Hill these days. Congress is currently weighing two financial reform bills that would, to varying degrees, reshape the way the financial system is regulated.

Still, Wall Street's influence in Washington appears to be as strong as ever. After all, it was just last spring that Senator Dick Durbin, frustrated by pushback on bankruptcy reform, denounced the financial sector's influence on the Senate: the banks, he said, “they frankly own the place.” The Center for Responsive Politics, a research group that tracks money in politics, reports that financial industries — the finance, insurance and real estate sectors, specifically — have been one of the biggest benefactors to Congress over the past two decades:

“The finance, insurance and real estate sector has given $2.3 billion to candidates, leadership PACs and party committees since 1989, which eclipses every other sector. Nineteen percent of total contributions from the employees and political action committees across all sectors came from the financial sector.”

And while campaign contributions don't equate to wrongdoing, it's worth noting that, while lawmakers ponder reforming the financial sector, the industry's campaign contributions have remained strong:

“Even with a number of large financial institutions folding or merging since last fall, the sector has still given more to federal candidates and party committees than any other sector this year at $78.2 million. Current lawmakers have brought in $661.6 million from the sector through their candidate committees and leadership PACs, with Democrats collecting 53 percent of that.”

We took a look at the Center for Responsive Politics's database, OpenSecrets.org, to see which members of Congress have so far received Wall Street money for the 2010 election cycle. The answers may surprise you. Check out our slideshow of the top 15 recipients and choose which politician may be taking too much money from Wall Street.

via The 15 Biggest Congressional Recipients Of Wall Street Campaign Cash.

It’s not Congress. It’s legalized corruption. Time to end it.

Former Rep. William J. Jefferson, a Louisiana Democrat, is off to prison. In August, a jury told him that bribery, racketeering and money laundering were not acceptable behaviors for anyone, let alone a member of Congress.

As a felon, Jefferson has had equally despicable company: Rep. Andrew J. Hinshaw, R-Calif. (accepting a bribe); Rep. Charles Diggs Jr., D-Mich. (payroll kickback scheme); Rep. Michael Myers, D-Pa. (accepting bribes from FBI agents impersonating Arab businessmen); Reps. John Murphy, D-N.Y., Frank Thompson, D-N.J., John Jenrette, D-S.C., and Raymond Lederer, D-Pa. (Arab businessmen bribery scandal, a.k.a. Abscam).

And Rep. Mario Biaggi, D-N.Y. (extorting money from a defense contractor); Rep. Mel Reynolds, D-Ill. (sex with underage campaign worker, bank fraud); Rep. Walter Tucker III, D-Calif. (accepting and demanding bribes); Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, D-Ill. (felony mail fraud); Rep. James A. Trafficant, D-Ohio (bribery, conspiracy and racketeering); Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (accepting bribes from defense contractors) and Robert W. Ney, R-Ohio (Abramoff scandal). I’m sure readers can name more.

via Scholars and Rogues » It’s not Congress. It’s legalized corruption. Time to end it..

The Money Man’s Best Friend

William Greider, The Nation

The Obama administration promised to reform the financial system and make it safe for the rest of us, but recent Congressional action is more likely to reset the fuse for another explosive calamity. The time bomb in this case is that arcane financial instrument known as derivatives–the hedging devices that the big banks sell to investors, corporations and other banks to reduce risk or evade the requirements to hold adequate capital on their books.

As the financial meltdown demonstrated, derivatives do not reduce risk. They amplify it and spread it around interlocking networks of unwitting investors. That house of cards collapsed worldwide a year ago. It would be tragic to let the bankers build a new one. Some reformers think all but the simplest, most visible forms of derivatives should be prohibited by law. The president prefers instead to regulate them. Derivatives, his advisers explained, would be less dangerous if they were traded openly in financial markets, just like stocks and bonds. Regulators could then put the brakes on dangerous excess if they saw it developing. Anyway, that was the theory.

But the “reform” legislation approved by the House Financial Services Committee on October 15 is a fiesta of exemptions, exceptions and twisted legalese that effectively defeat the original purpose. Only experts can divine the actual meaning of the bill’s densely worded provisions, and many of them have reacted with disgust. The “entanglements of derivatives exposures” among oversize banks “is the equivalent of the San Andreas Fault of our financial system,” veteran financier Robert Johnson testified at an October 7 hearing on the draft bill. If Congress does not disarm derivatives, he warned, it could lead to another cascade of failure that would give regulators no choice but once again to rush to the rescue of the banks dubbed “too big to fail.”

Full Story The Money Man’s Best Friend.

‘No’ Votes on Health Care Bill Received $2.3 Million More from Health Insurance Industry

Members of Congress who noted “no” on health care reform legislation late Saturday night have received $2.3 million more in campaign donations from health insurance interests than those who voted in favor of the legislation to overhaul of the nation’s health care system, according to an analysis released by a coalition of campaign reform groups.

“The health care debate shows that our campaign finance system is as much in crisis as our health care system,” says David Donnelly, national campaigns director of Public Campaign Action Fund, the watchdog group that conducted the analysis for the coalition. “As measured in campaign donations, it clearly pays to be against reform and with the health insurance interests.”

The health insurance industry donated $12.5 million to the campaigns and leadership PACs of 215 members of Congress who voted against the House health care legislation this weekend. Members voting against the legislation received, on average, 24 percent more in campaign money than those who voted yes, according to analysis of campaign contribution data from the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

Full Story On The Hill: ‘No’ Votes on Health Care Bill Received $2.3 Million More from Health Insurance Industry.

What Physicians Know

There is no sound reason for Congress to protect the private health insurance industry. But of course they always have and always will because it is the source of huge amounts of money for political campaigns.

I had a long conversation with my favorite physician, who has operated on me twice successfully. He is an incredibly kind person without an ounce of greed or pretense. Like other physicians I have spoken to, he spoke eloquently about the terrible times he consistently has with private health insurance companies.

While he praises Medicare for its simplicity and certainty, he has absolutely nothing positive to say about private insurers. They take up huge amounts of time of him and his staff, trying in every possible way to deny services to their customers (his patients) and also to pay as little as possible to him. His endless struggles with the insurance companies make his life miserable. Meanwhile all he cares about is giving his patients the very best care and not making them suffer because of their insurance carriers.

Like so many of us he sees the need for major reforms of our health care system, but remains pessimistic about what Congress and President Obama will eventually deliver. He is incredulous at how executives of private insurers make vast amounts of money while making physicians and their patients suffer endless annoyances and negative impacts on health care. And they get away with making people pay more and more money for worse and worse insurance.

Full Story Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.

Lobbyists Quit in Record Numbers

It’s been a rough few years for lobbyists. They have been attacked by President Barack Obama. They have been targeted in corruption probes. And they have been hurt by the economy.

And many have decided they’re not going to take it anymore.

A record number of lobbyists have quit the business this year, according to a study released today.

About 1,400 lobbyists, or 8% of the industry, left in the three-month period ending June 30, according to a joint study of lobbying records by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics and OMB Watch. Typically, a few hundred lobbyists leave the business every quarter.

In all, there are still more than 11,000 lobbyists in Washington, according to records. That’s actually up 20% since 1998.

It’s impossible to know for sure the causes of the recent K Street retreat. But the study’s authors blame Obama’s new antilobbying rules. When Obama took office, he imposed a ban on registered lobbyists working in his administration. He has also barred lobbyists from lobbying the administration on certain topics.

Full Story Lobbyists Quit in Record Numbers – Washington Wire – WSJ.

Document sheds light on ethics probe in Congress

NEW DETAILS ON TWO CHAIRMEN Critics surprised by a prolific panel

After years of criticism that congressional lawmakers were reluctant to investigate their colleagues, the disclosure in recent days of a sensitive document from the House ethics committee offers the contradictory portrait of a panel actively pursuing a range of probes even as Democrats under scrutiny remain in positions of power.

The 22-page document revealed that the ethics committee, as of late July, was looking into the activities of at least 19 lawmakers, including reviews of home mortgages and interviews about corporate-backed trips for members of Congress to Caribbean resorts. Combined with the inquiries being conducted by a new ethics office, the document showed a far more robust set of investigations than previously revealed.

But the document also brings potential political peril for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), whose party claimed the majority in November 2006 after she promised to “drain the swamp” of corruption on Capitol Hill. Two and a half years into Pelosi’s reign, more than 25 Democrats have been targeted for ethics reviews by the two ethics bodies, while just seven Republicans appeared to be under scrutiny, according to the document.

Full Story Document sheds light on ethics probe in Congress – washingtonpost.com.