K Street lobbyists tire of Republican demands

June 7, 2005

Yesterday I noted that top-level Republicans had created the K Street Project, which is an ongoing effort to seize control of Washington’s lobbying apparatus through intimidation, hardball political tactics, and even private threats. Today we see that K Street itself, despite being dominated by GOP staffers, is starting to resent their puppet masters.

An alleged sense of entitlement among some lawmakers and aides is raising hackles on K Street.

Speaking to The Hill on condition of anonymity, more than a dozen lobbyists said there are some on Capitol Hill who actively solicit lunches, drinks and other favors from K Street and seem to regard it as their personal expense account.

When most of us look at K Street in Washington, we see the home of the city’s powerful lobbying industry. When congressional Republicans look at K Street, they see an ATM.

To hear these lobbyists tell it, the culture is becoming ridiculous.

* A Republican congressman, whose family was visiting from the Northeast, called and asked to be taken to dinner.

* A Senate staffer, who was having dinner at the Capital Grille, noticed a lobbyist across the bar, walked over to him and handed him his bill.

* During the Medicare conference in August 2003, Ways and Means and Energy and Commerce committee staffers had planned to play in a lobbyist-funded paintball tournament. But once word got out about it, it was scuttled to stave off bad press and was not rescheduled.

* Time magazine reported that Tim Berry and Tony Rudy, aides to House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas), accepted golf equipment from the now-disgraced GOP lobbyist Abramoff.

These guys aren’t just corrupt, they’ve grown so drunk with power that they’re casual about their sleaze. Just 10 years after the GOP takeover of Congress, Republicans have come to believe they own the place and that sense of entitlement leads them to think they can do what they please.

“The arrogance that brought Republicans into power is arrogance that will take them out of power, and that’s what you see more of on the Hill,” said a former GOP aide-turned-corporate lobbyist.

Remember, these are Republicans talking about how arrogant Republican lawmakers have become.

Until they start losing some elections, it’s only going to get worse. Election Day is only 518 days away.

And counting.

  • I don’t get it–why are the lobbyists complaining? These demands are small potatoes in terms of the ROI. If I were a lobbyist, I’d be happy to pick up the check.

  • gmanedit – It’s the Red Queen problem: in this place it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. (Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass) The more they shell out, the more they have to shell out next time just to get the same favor. ROI drops over time. Economics says that there will reach a point where it costs them as much to keeps the GOP happy as it will to piss them off.

    Microeconomics says that the more the lobbyists get treated like personal cash slaves the sooner the ROI gets unaccfeptable for them.

    I was wondering whent his would start to happen.

  • I guess I really don’t understand how all this works, but it seems to me that if all the lobbyists are Republican, and Republicans generally do things lock-step; why do the Republican lobbyists need the politicians? What, are the Congressmen going to start enforcing regulations and being anti-corporate if the cash-cow quits giving?

    One of these days, the Congressional Republicans will realize how much better everything was with the Democrats in charge. After all, the Republicans don’t really want to do anything; they just want to stop the Dems from doing things, as well as reversing a few things that the Dems already did (taxes, regulations, Social Security, etc). But beyond that, they have no real agenda. And if they lobbyists don’t need to worry about regulations, and the Social Conservatives continue to believe that Republicans should be doing all the things they promised; it seems like the Republicans are much worse off in power. And it’s always easier to come up with the good rhetoric when you’re not in a position to do anything about it. Plus, the longer they’re in power, the more they can screw-up; thus giving Dems a better platform to run on. So in every case, they’re just shooting themselves in the foot.

    Again, maybe I’m naive, but it seems to me that the best thing for Congressional Republicans would be if they handed the keys back over to us and got back into the opposition. They’re much happier there, and it will put their supporters into a more desparate position.

  • See, that’s what happens if you feed stray dogs. They just keep coming back for more.

  • If a Democrate had done what some of the Republicans did the Republicans would have been yelling it from the roof-tops and saying how evil and corrupt those Democrats are.

    Not only is what they are doing wrong often illegal as well as being unethical, it so so blatently hipocritical that it’s nauseating….

    What I want to know is why K Street still puts up with it. Yea they may get legislation that benefits them, but considering how the Congress is so divided that isn’t exactly guaranteed to pass. One would think these “guys” would have a little more self respect than be turned into ATM and feed traughs.

  • My favorite point was the congressional staffer giving his dinner bill to a lobbyist. That is just too funny. I can imagine nothing so corrupt then that.

    Doc Biobrain said “And if the lobbyists don’t need to worry about regulations” [why keep the Republicans in power.]

    Sorry, it just doesn’t work that way. Lobbyists are as much interested in creating regulations as they are in avoiding them. The question is, who is getting regulated. For instance, the corn growers of America want the sugar interests in Florida and South Carolina (cane and beets, respectively) to defend the HUGE tariff on foreign sugar so that corn syrup, an alternate sweetener, is cost competitive. This is called rent seeking (really, you need to read George Will occasionally, just keep a salt shaker need by) and most American industries lobby hard to get them.

    Most liberals automatically assume regulations are there to protect consumers or the environment. That is not always true. And often, evil little provisions that destroy businesses and industries are being slipped into laws and regulations under the cover of our liberal concerns. You have to watch out for the unintended consequences. Like the costs of sugar being absurdly high in this country.

  • The reason lobbyists put up with that stuff is that their paychecks depend not on the politicians themselves but the business entities who pay the lobbyists to influence those politicians. If a given lobbyist fails to be effective then the corporations will just move on to somebody else, which is why the politicians have the lobbyists over a barrel and can get away with being such corrupt abusers.

    It’s a kind of payola. The lobbyists retain their influence by letting the politicians walk all over them when they feel like it, and the politicians get their free ride by letting the lobbyists point them in the right direction on legislation now and then.

    Hope that clears it up.

  • Omigod ! Lobbyist being shocked by, like, unethical behavior.

    Dear Carpetbagger, you’ve just made today a better day.

  • There go those Washington Republicans again.

    Bless ODub for coming up with this wonderful epithet for them.

    They’re Washington Republicans. Synonymous with SLEAZE.

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