What will the Dems do now that they control Congress?

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Ogie Oglethorpe
No arguement from me. Unless the intent is to keep all public monies out of politics (yeah right) each party sells themselves to some form of special interest. FACT!

Which goes to the ludicrous assertions of culture of corruption nonsense.

You wanna vote the bums out for fresh new ideas and fresh faces not corrupted, have at it. But pardon my smugness when those voted out are likewise replaced by career politicians (by definition corrupt).

did you read what I wrote. What some republicans did went BEYOND what Steny Hoyer etc did. I can see why both Republicans, on the one hand, and Kossacks, on the other, would want to elide the difference.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Originally posted by lord of the mark


did you read what I wrote. What some republicans did went BEYOND what Steny Hoyer etc did. I can see why both Republicans, on the one hand, and Kossacks, on the other, would want to elide the difference.

LotM,

Doesn't matter. Many so called excesses will now be revisted a thousand fold. Those who have long histories are most susceptible to inferences of wrong doing (even if they are mere inferences). And Dems have long long histories of daliances.

Nope house cleaning is and was required. While I agree Hoyer is a lesser of two evils over Murtha it is ever illuminating to understand the gut reaction that the cronyism (option Murtha) of Pelosi holds a higher sway than the desire to have a more pristine house (option Hoyer). Yep more of the same as old guard pols rely on trusted allies more than campaign promises.

[Ramo]

Emmanuel's not my pal. He's part of the problem (as is Pelosi), but not in as big a way as Hoyer. I'd much rather have someone like John Lewis as Majority Leader, but that's not a realistic possibility.

It's about all about magnitude. Hoyer advertises himself as K-Street's chief liaison. He wants regular meetings with lobbyists to shake them down. His senior legislative adviser is in charge of raising donations from K-Street. Hell, he added the Roll Call article to his web site, expressing pride about his own K-Street Project (calling it that), only taking it down after having it pointed out how hypocritical he looked.

[Arrian]

Cmon, what youre implying is that anyone whos ever solicited a donation from ANY lobbyist, under any conditions of transparency. is a legal bribe taker. That would make at least 90% of congressional dems, and certainly the last Dem administration (of which your pal Rahm Emmanuel was a part) legal bribe takers. I very much suspect that goes for Pelosi as well.

Yes. Nearly every national politician is bought and paid for. I'm not sure how to fix that (without the cure being worse than the disease).

-Arrian

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Ramo
Emmanuel's not my pal. He's part of the problem (as is Pelosi), but not in as big a way as Hoyer. I'd much rather have someone like John Lewis as Majority Leader, but that's not a realistic possibility.

It's about all about magnitude. Hoyer advertises himself as K-Street's chief liaison. He wants regular meetings with lobbyists to shake them down. His senior legislative adviser is in charge of raising donations from K-Street. Hell, he added the Roll Call article to his web site, expressing pride about his own K-Street Project (calling it that), only taking it down after having it pointed out how hypocritical he looked.

I just read Sirotablog, so I dont need your talking points. Its also filled with lieberman hate, Hillary hate, DLC hate, and allegations that Clinton sold out his voters by supporting free trade.

1. K street are spokesmen for industries that have a legitimate interest in legislation - they should have a point of access. 2. I see no evidence of a "shakedown" a loaded word if ever there was one. 3. I dont know how his staff is organized, and im not sure it matters. CLAs would usally have contacts on K street.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Arrian


Yes. Nearly every national politician is bought and paid for. I'm not sure how to fix that (without the cure being worse than the disease).

-Arrian

sigh. My point was that taking money from lobbyists does not necessarily equal being bought and paid for.

Look I once worked in a big company that had a pac. They gave money to guys who supported their industry. Most of those guys would have done so ANYWAY, since our industry was important to their districts, there were lots of (union) employees who supported similar issues, etc. They werent bought and paid for. That happens, but acting as if everything is the same is just the excuse that defenders of abuse like.

[lord of the mark]

http://www.hoyer.house.gov/newsroom/index.asp?ID=679

[Ramo]

From the article I posted earlier:

More problematic than the fundraising program has been Hoyer’s stance on lobbying reform, in which he has consistently stood in the way of Democratic efforts to unite behind a far-reaching approach. Hoyer’s opposition to reform appears to be of long standing, and well known on both sides of the aisle. Back in October 1994, Congress had been considering a lobbying reform bill that many lawmakers privately considered too restrictive. According to Roll Call, DeLay and Hoyer were walking down the Capitol steps shortly before leaving for the October recess in advance of the midterms that would bring the GOP to power, when the Texan “cupped his hands around his mouth and chuckled to Hoyer, ‘But lobbying reform is dead!’” DeLay, it seems, understood even then that he and Hoyer were of one mind on the issue.

Not much has changed in the intervening 12 years. When lobbying reform resurfaced as an issue in Washington last year in the wake of the Abramoff scandal, congressional Democrats at first seized on it. They knew that Republicans, responding to the need to appear to be doing something, would put out a watered-down “reform” proposal that would do little to curb the outsized influence business lobbyists currently enjoy. By rallying around a far tougher platform of their own, Democrats hoped to burnish their party’s image with voters as an honest, responsive alternative to the GOP’s fealty to corporate interests. Emanuel, the DCCC chair, announced that he intended to make the issues raised by the Abramoff scandal the centerpiece of the Democratic effort to retake the House, and Pelosi struck a similar note.

But the Democrats’ hoped-for unity did not materialize, thanks in part to Hoyer. In the summer of 2005, Pelosi and a host of other Democrats co-sponsored a bill introduced by Emanuel and Rep. Marty Meehan (D-Mass.) that would have prohibited lobbyists from paying for members’ non-campaign-related travel, required members to disclose all congressional trips, and increased penalties for violations of lobbying disclosure laws, among other steps. But Hoyer announced that he preferred an approach that addressed misconduct by individual members, rather than cracking down on the activities of lobbyists—and pointedly did not co-sponsor the measure (though he did endorse it). Ultimately, Hoyer did come around to supporting another strong proposal that Pelosi announced in January 2006, but even here, his heart didn’t seem to be in it: He was the only Democrat in a leadership position in either chamber to miss the package’s press rollout event. And that same week he was still expressing a reluctance to crack down. “It is not the rules that are the issue, it’s the character of the players,” he told Bloomberg News.

More broadly, Democrats have not made lobbying reform or congressional ethics central to their national message for the upcoming midterms, as Pelosi and Emanuel had indicated they would. There are several reasons for this: For one thing, most of the evidence suggests that voters care far more about Iraq and gas prices. But some Democratic insiders say another factor has been the unwillingness of certain members of the caucus to risk losing some of the perks of office, or to offend their corporate backers, by taking a strong stand in favor of reform. That position was no doubt strengthened by the presence in leadership of a politician with a record of publicly touting his close ties to K Street, and a stated reluctance to seriously tighten lobbying rules.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2006/0611.roth.html

[Drake Tungsten]

Pelosi's endorsement of Murtha is looking less and less like kabuki...

House Speaker-to-be Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) will ensure that Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) wins his race for majority leader, a key Murtha ally said Monday night.

"She will ensure that they [the Murtha camp] win. This is hard-ball politics," said Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.), a longtime Murtha supporter. "We are entering an era where when the Speaker instructs you what to do, you do it."

Pelosi recently endorsed Murtha’s bid for majority leader against House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), but it was unclear whether she would use her clout as the first Democratic Speaker in 12 years to help Murtha win or whether her letter simply expressed a personal preference as a favor to Murtha.

Pelosi’s move was deliberate, Moran said, and she was already leaning on her colleagues to affect the outcome.

"Yes, she’s making calls to people. She is contacting people and letting them know that it’s an unequivocal letter," Moran said.

http://hillnews.com/thehill/export/TheHill/News/Frontpage/111406/murthawin.html

[KrazyHorse]

Actually, it's looking more and more like Mutha and his followers just don't know that it's Kabuki theater.

[Drake Tungsten]

Moran could indeed be full of ****. That's a pretty tall tale to be telling, however, and Pelosi certainly has reason to want to get rid of Hoyer...

[KrazyHorse]

I haven't really been following it. What's the reason?

[Winston]

So, how do you figure, is this guy a bad Murtha or just one sorry Murtha?

[Drake Tungsten]

I haven't really been following it. What's the reason?

Hoyer has been one of Pelosi's main rivals for power in the Democratic House caucus for a while now. Pelosi beat out Hoyer for minority whip before she became minority leader when Gephardt stepped down.

[Drake Tungsten]

In other news, how hilarious is the picture of Harry Reid that ran along this Reuters article about his ascension to Senate Majority Leader? It's very subtle...