The non-profit, non-partisan Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has released its assessment of the 20 most corrupt Congresspersons and 5 "Dishonorable Mentions". You can read the PDF "Beyond Delay Report" for yourself. Also see this Netscape version. Some of the names on there might surprise you. They did me. (HT: DftCW)
The "20 Most Corrupt Members of Congress" :
The "5 Dishonorable Mentions":
Notice there are 3:17 Dems to GOP in the first category, and 1:4 in the second. So Dems are 20% as corrupt (roughly) in the House and 25% as corrupt in the Senate as Lincoln's party...
A well-established trend has been observed historically that the majority party always grows more corrupt over time, until a reversal of fortuntes occurs (as will this November), and then the fraudulence cycle perpetuates in the other direction. Hooray for change, the only constant known to man ;)
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Technorati tags: Politics
- Sen. Conrad Burns (R-MT)
- Sen. Bill Frist (R-TN)
- Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA)
- Rep. Roy Blunt (R-MO)
- Rep. Ken Calvert (R-CA)
- Rep. John Doolittle (R-CA)
- Rep. Tom Feeney (R-FL)
- Rep. Katherine Harris (R-FL)
- Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA)
- Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-CA)
- Rep. Gary Miller (R-CA)
- Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-WV)
- Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-CO)
- Rep. Richard Pombo (R-CA)
- Rep. Rick Renzi (R-AZ)
- Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX)
- Rep. John Sweeney (R-NY)
- Rep. Charles Taylor (R-NC)
- Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA)
- Rep. Curt Weldon (R-PA)
- Rep. Chris Cannon (R-UT)
- Rep. Dennis Hastert (R-IL)
- Rep. J.D. Hayworth (R-AZ)
- Rep. John Murtha (D-PA)
- Rep. Don Sherwood (R-PA)
Notice there are 3:17 Dems to GOP in the first category, and 1:4 in the second. So Dems are 20% as corrupt (roughly) in the House and 25% as corrupt in the Senate as Lincoln's party...
A well-established trend has been observed historically that the majority party always grows more corrupt over time, until a reversal of fortuntes occurs (as will this November), and then the fraudulence cycle perpetuates in the other direction. Hooray for change, the only constant known to man ;)
Technorati tags: Politics
I don't know how you can use the term "non-partisan" to describe a group that has this paragraph in their "About US: Background" page:
ReplyDelete---
Conservative groups such as these have no real parallel in the progressive arena. There are a number of non-partisan groups that address government honesty, including Common Cause, Public Citizen, the Center for Public Integrity, and Democracy 21. While we applaud their efforts, we have noted that these groups focus principally on research and legislation. They do not use litigation to target outrageous conduct, nor do they bring the message of injustice to the people the way their conservative counterparts do. Because these public interest organizations focus mostly on policy issues and not on obstacles faced by ordinary citizens, these groups have not mobilized a shift in public opinion on the issue of government honesty. CREW fills that niche.
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http://www.citizensforethics.org/about/background.php
It seems that you failed to note the context of that last paragraph on the page. They are pointing out that no non-partisan private watchdog has before existed, only "avowedly conservative groups" which "have no real parallel in the progressive arena". The sentences before this paragraph read:
ReplyDeleteBut it was not until the 1990's that some watchdog groups hit on the strategy of using private investigation and litigation to parallel and support government investigations. This began with Whitewater, continued through the campaign finance investigations, and culminated in the Paula Jones litigation and the presidential impeachment proceedings. The groups that have pioneered this type of legal advocacy are avowedly conservative: Judicial Watch, the Rutherford Institute, and the National Legal and Policy Center, to name just a few.
All they're saying is that there were some of these same watchdog groups before, but only conservative ones, with no progressive ones to balance it out.
If this group looked over some progressive Congressperson in their assessment, or unfairly maligned some conservative Congressperson, I would love for you to point it out to me. As I stated, I think the disparity in the ratio of Dems:GOP stems from a historical (and extra-American political) trend that the "ruling party" always grows more corrupt over time -- it's like a big "good ol' boy" network where favors get traded like stocks on the NYSE.
Lobbyists of the fradulent sort don't waste much time and money pandering to politicians who can't get them what they want, aka the minority party.
I'm not stupid, I know that in a few years, some Dem version of Jack Abramoff will surface, once the Dems are back in control of the Congress. But I think that an Executive and Legislative branch which are united is dangerous, regardless of the party in charge. Too much localized power, too much rubber-stamping.
And these conservatives agree with me: they want the Dems to regain Congressional control to curb the ridiculous fiscal and foreign policies of our Administration, which have all been rubber-stamped by Congress.
By the way, I was hoping you'd be willing, when you get the time, to post your thoughts on this exchange (see follow-ups HERE and HERE) where questions were raised as to whether Calvinism promotes a democratic and free society or not.
PS: I am a libertarian (not capitalized on purpose), so both parties simulataneously piss me off and appeal to me in different areas of fiscal and social policy.
*lol*
ReplyDeleteJust FYI, my comments were not meant as an attempt to say that Republicans are picture-perfect clean or anything. Politically, I'm a conservative, which means that, like you, both parties also simultaneously piss me off.
Anyway, I'll look into the exchange you linked to re: calvinism/free society and let you know what I think.