Cleaning House
Congressional ethics & the Democratic party

The influence of money on our political system has become anti-democratic. Most representatives mainly represent those who paid their campaign bills, not the majority of their constituents. I'm proud to say my congressman (David Price) is truly an exception, and one of four trying to redeem the system with several very good ideas. See the Christian Science Monitor article Can Congress police its own ethics? for a brief synopsis of their ideas:

With a flurry of corruption indictments and related plea agreements threatening to become a storm, Congress is feeling the heat on ethics reform.

Criminal investigations in Texas, California, and Florida are shining a bright light on standards of conduct in Congress, helping sink public confidence in the institution to its lowest point in more than a decade.

Congress is responding. After partisan fights kept it dormant for much of the 109th Congress, the House ethics committee resumes work next month.

Meanwhile, four House Democrats last week proposed a package of reforms to help protect the integrity of the Congress. These include a ban on lobbyist-sponsored travel and lobbying on the floor of the House by former members to "make it harder for lobbyists to put their fingers on the legislative scales."

Other proposed rule changes aim to restore checks and balances to the legislative process, such as making it an ethical offense to use earmarks - items in spending bills that designate funds for a purpose, usually specific to a member's district - to buy votes, halting extended roll call votes, and prohibiting votes on legislation until members have time to familiarize themselves with it.

"People have been scared straight, and between now and Election Day will be one of the purest periods in American life," says Rep. Barney Frank (D) of Massachusetts, a sponsor. Other sponsors include Reps. David Obey (D) of Wisconsin, David Price (D) of North Carolina, and Tom Allen (D) of Maine.

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Since 1998, lobbyists report spending some $13 billion to influence Congress, the White House, and federal agencies, according to the Center for Public Integrity. Over the same period, more than 200 former members of Congress and 42 former agency heads have registered as federal lobbyists.

Democrats say the scandals are a sign of a pervasive GOP culture of corruption that is affecting the cost of daily living for Americans on issues ranging from gasoline prices to the cost of prescription drugs.

"The Republican Medicare drug plan is complicated and confusing because Republicans wrote it to meet the needs of drug companies and private insurers, not the needs of Medicare beneficiaries," said House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi in a briefing with reporters last Thursday. In 2004, the healthcare industry reported spending some $325 million to lobby Congress.

Reformers outside the Congress say that neither party has been willing to clean house on Capitol Hill.

"The House has completely abdicated its constitutional responsibility to police itself," says Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics (CREW), which has prepared ethics complaints against 13 members of Congress. Without the support of a House member, those complaints can't go forward. "There is still no member of Congress, in either party, willing to file an ethics complaint," she adds.

Nearly 90 percent of Americans say that political corruption is a serious problem, according to an AP-Ipsos poll.

David Price represents a district known as the Research Triangle at the center of three major research universities. He is a former professor of political science and a real straight shooter. However, one of the frustrations is that when various people urge me to write my congressman, I already know he is planning to vote the way I want. A letter or email is simply a waste of both of our times. For those of you with representatives that have not come on board this reform plan, I urge you to contact him or her with a plea to join in a Democratic campaign against corruption. Not only is such a campaign the right thing to do, but according to the polls it will play well with the American people.