New Ethics Rules

[aoxamaxoa]

http://www.thehill.com/thehill/export/TheHill/News/Frontpage/010307/demrules.html

I would have applauded the republicans if this would have been their idea............but it wasn't!

Granted, most of the Dems are just as corrupt and shi**y as the Repuggies, they just don't have the balls to be obviously evil.

"Republicans Can Break All the Rules They Want, But Democrats MUST Keep Their Promises"
http://www.newshounds.us/2007/01/03/republicans_can_break_all_the_rules_they_want_but_democrats_must_keep_their_promises.php


An Agenda for the Democrats' Second Hundred Hours
(or Putting Some Gingrich in Pelosi)
by Sally Kohn
http://www.commondreams.org/views07/0104-22.htm
"John F. Kennedy once said of the Democratic party, "Our duty as a party is not to our party alone, but to the nation and, indeed, to all mankind. Our duty is not merely the preservation of political power but the preservation of peace and freedom."

[NellieBly]

How about the schmo that voted against it. Who would vote against being ethical??

[rwarn17588]

So who was the "schmoe" voting against it, and why?

Perhaps this lawmaker had Inhofe-type reasoning and we can quickly dismiss it. But maybe the reasons he/she voted against it is legitimate, and maybe we ought to take a closer look.

Sen. Russ Feingold was one of the very few who voted against military action in Iraq. Guess what? His reasoning for casting a "no" vote were well-thought-out and, as it turns out, prescient.

[NellieBly]

Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., was elected America's first female speaker of the House on Thursday in a bipartisan celebration of a historic breakthrough, and hours later she presided over passage of the broadest ethics and lobbying reforms since the Watergate era.

Democrats took control of the House and Senate after 12 years of nearly unbroken Republican rule, with calls for bipartisanship and a pledge to move quickly on an agenda of health care, homeland security, education and energy proposals.

Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., took the helm of the Senate after a closed-door session in the Capitol's stately Old Senate Chamber. But with the eyes of history riveted by Pelosi, it was her day.

"This is an historic moment, for Congress and for the women of this country," said Pelosi, who is now second in the line of succession to the president, behind the vice president. "It is a moment for which we have waited more than 200 years. For our daughters and granddaughters, today we have broken the marble ceiling. To our daughters and our granddaughters, the sky is the limit."

In the House, Democrats did not skip a beat between formally taking control and getting to work on what they have called their hundred-hours agenda.

Thursday night, the House nearly unanimously approved a package of internal rules changes designed to sever cozy links between lawmakers and lobbyists.

The changes would prohibit House members or employees from knowingly accepting gifts or travel from a registered lobbyist, foreign agent or lobbyist's client. Lawmakers could no longer fly on corporate jets. In addition, congressional travel financed by outside groups would have to be pre-approved by the ethics committee and immediately disclosed to the public.

100-hour agenda


What House Democrats want to do with the first 100 hours of the 110th Congress:

Minimum wage: Raise minimum wage from $5.15 per hour to $7.25 per hour over two years.

Stem cells: Expand opportunity for federally funded research on embryonic stem cells.

Drug prices: Require government to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies for lower Medicare drug prices.

Energy: Recover royalties many lawmakers believe have been unfairly avoided; establish a fund to promote renewable energy and conservation; and repeal handful of oil-industry tax breaks.

Homeland security: Create intelligence oversight panel within House Appropriations Committee and implement 9/11 Commission recommendations.

Student loans: Halve interest rates on government student loans.

Spending: Re-impose rule requiring tax cuts or new spending on benefit programs such as Medicare to be accompanied by revenue increases or tax cuts elsewhere in budget.

The measure was approved 430-1, with only Rep. Dan Burton, R-Ind., voting against it.

[NellieBly]

Burton, who could not be reached by phone after the evening vote, took the single most expensive trip by the delegation last year. Burton and his wife traveled to Taiwan on a $15,520 trip paid for by the ROC-USA Business Council.
Burton, a member of the House International Relations Committee, has accepted more than a dozen trips to Taiwan for himself or his aides over the past decade.


Sounds like a good reason to vote against being ethical.

[NellieBly]

He called Clinton a scumbag after the Lewinski scandal then it was discovered, and he had to admit, that he had an affair himself, that produced a child. Can you say 'hypocrite?' He is a known womanizer. This guy can't even spell ethics, let alone possess any.

[rwarn17588]

Or, for cryin' out loud, Dan Burton???

Maybe he has legit reason for voting no. But I very much doubt it.

Typical of sanctimonious right-wingers: They want oversight and accountability for everyone but themselves.

[tim huntzinger]

If i were a Republican - READ CAREFULLY, NOW: 'IF' - I would have voted against it in a heartbeat, sight unseen.

The feckless milquetoasts of the GOP fought a watered down measure tooth and nail just last year.

I get the strategery, to keep one's powder dry for more important fights raises the value of that opposition.  Lady Nancy is all aglow now, but any and all opposition of any kind to the Dems' plans will lead to the most vicious of attacks on recalcitrant GOP'ers.

Just like Sullivan to follow, not lead.

[Wrinkle]

Who came up with the idea we needed a law to tell legislators it was illegal to take bribes?

Law and Ethics are clearly different things, and, like morality, cannot be legislated.

It seems very odd to me that in America, if it isn't against the 'law', it's o.k.
The reciprocal being, it's not illegal if there's not a law.

There's some broad things in law which can/should be used more often in cases like this, like 'corruption', 'dereliction of duty' or 'breech of peace'. Then, let juries decide.

For law to be encumbered with minute details of any possible infraction only encourages politicians, and makes us think we need them.