{"id":7310,"date":"2006-05-03T14:09:02","date_gmt":"2006-05-03T18:09:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/?p=7310"},"modified":"2006-05-03T14:09:02","modified_gmt":"2006-05-03T18:09:02","slug":"sham-ethics-measure-set-to-pass-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/sham-ethics-measure-set-to-pass-house\/","title":{"rendered":"Sham ethics measure set to pass House"},"content":{"rendered":"

The good news is the House is poised to vote on a measure today that allegedly will change the way the chamber operates. The bad news is it’s a plan crafted by [tag]House[\/tag] [tag]Republicans[\/tag], which is hollow and insulting<\/a>.<\/p>\n

House lawmakers today are expected to approve the first overhaul of [tag]Congress[\/tag]ional [tag]ethics[\/tag] rules in a decade, despite vigorous opposition from Democrats and outside watchdog groups who assail the measure as too weak.<\/p>\n

After a victory at the buzzer last week on the rule governing debate on the measure, the bill is not expected to encounter much resistance from within GOP ranks today, senior [tag]Republican[\/tag] lawmakers and aides predicted.<\/p>\n

“I’m confident we’ll complete action on this tomorrow,” House Majority Leader [tag]John Boehner[\/tag] (R-Ohio) said Tuesday.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To call this legislation a “reform” measure is a bit of a joke. The WaPo called it “diluted [tag]snake oil[\/tag]<\/a>” today, which is more than fair.<\/p>\n

House Republicans took a plan from January that was already pretty pathetic and made it considerably weaker<\/a>. The new-and-not-improved “lobbying reform” measure now leaves untouched existing restrictions on lobbyists’ gifts and meals in place, does nothing to restrict former lawmakers who want to lobby Congress, allows junkets paid for by private interests, and leaves enforcement up to a House Ethics Committee that’s completely dysfunctional.<\/p>\n

The tricky part of this, however, is that some House Dems are inclined to vote for it.
\n
\nHouse Republicans seem to realize that the Dems’ “culture of [tag]corruption[\/tag]” talk has been effective, so they’ve drawn up this sham legislation as a way to inoculate themselves. The GOP believes Republican lawmakers will get credit for passing a “[tag]reform[\/tag]” bill and voters won’t be informed enough to realize that the efforts is just a con job.<\/p>\n

Dems, meanwhile, know it’s a con job, but aren’t allowed to bring a real reform measure to the floor for a vote. A handful of them are worried — if they oppose the bill, will they be accused of opposing “reform”? The WaPo said<\/a> the concerns are misplaced.<\/p>\n

Democrats tempted to vote for this sham because they’re scared of 30-second ads that accuse them of opposing lobbying reform ought to ask themselves whether they really think so little of their constituents.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I hope that’s right. Dems have counted on voters seeing through GOP nonsense before — and it doesn’t always work.<\/p>\n

As for Republicans, the fact that nearly all of the GOP caucus has embraced this bill shows just how low they’ve sunk. Rep. Christopher Shays (R-Conn.), who is helping lead the opposition to the legislation, told his colleagues last week, “I happen to believe we are losing our moral authority<\/a> to lead this place.” I’d say it’s already happened.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The good news is the House is poised to vote on a measure today that allegedly will change the way the chamber operates. The bad news is it’s a plan crafted by [tag]House[\/tag] [tag]Republicans[\/tag], which is hollow and insulting. House lawmakers today are expected to approve the first overhaul of [tag]Congress[\/tag]ional [tag]ethics[\/tag] rules in a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7310\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}