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The Sins of the 109th Congress
November 6, 2006
Few people will miss the 109th Congress. Rolling Stone called it the "worst Congress ever." Only 16 percent of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing—the legislative body's lowest approval rating in 14 years. "The 109th Congress is so bad that it makes you wonder if democracy is a failed experiment," notes constitutional scholar Jonathan Turley. Congress's conservative leadership has systematically committed each of the seven deadly sins through its legislative inaction, culture of corruption, and pay-to-play system. But most importantly, this Congress has put the protection of its own power over the best interests of the American public. This Congress has committed all of the seven deadly sins; below are three examples. Be sure to vote on Tuesday and help wipe them away Congress.
- This Congress is gluttons of golfing, prostitutes, and expensive meals. The 109th Congress will be remembered far more for its scandals than for any legislative accomplishments. Half of all Americans believe that most members of Congress are corrupt. On Friday, Rep. Bob Ney (R-OH) resigned from Congress after pleading guilty last month in the Jack Abramoff investigation. In addition to Ney, five other congressional staffers and members of the Bush administration have pleaded guilty to giving legislative favors in exchange for perks from Abramoff, including golf junkets, foreign trips, sporting event tickets, and expensive meals. At least half a dozen other House and Senate members — such as Rep. Richard Pombo (R-CA) and Sen. Conrad Burns (R-MT) — while not yet convicted, find their past ties to the lobbyist haunting their current re-election campaigns. In March, former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-CA) was sentenced to more than eight years in federal prison — the longest sentence ever given to a member of Congress — for accepting $2.4 million in bribes in exchange for lucrative defense contracts. FBI documents also allege Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA) accepted bribes to help iGate, a small technology company, "win contracts with federal agencies and with businesses and governments in West Africa." Overall, "Mr. Jefferson and his family received more than $400,000 from iGate."
- This Congress is guilty of corporate avarice. Large corporations and special interests may actually miss the 109th Congress. House Majority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) has "raised campaign contributions at a rate of about $10,000 a day since February, surpassing the pace set by former Representative Tom DeLay." His biggest donors have included the political action committees of lobbying firms, drug and cigarette makers, banks, health insurers, oil companies, and military contractors. In return, Boehner and other members of the conservative leadership in the House and the Senate have been kind to these special interests, often at the expense of the American public. In Aug. 2005, President Bush signed into law an energy bill that lavished $14.5 billion in tax breaks on energy firms, nearly 60 percent of which went to "oil, natural gas, coal, electric utilities and nuclear power." Also in 2005, Bush signed into law a bankruptcy bill that made it more difficult for average Americans suffering from financial misfortune to declare bankruptcy. The credit card industry, which took in $30 billion in profits in 2004 and doled out more than $7.8 million to candidates in the 2004 election cycle, lobbied relentlessly for the bill. Congress allowed the Bush administration to hand out nearly $50 billion in Iraq contracts with "little or no oversight" to companies that were strong Republican donors.
- This Congress is the definition of sloth. The 109th Congress has, arguably, done less than the "Do-Nothing Congress" of 1948. Congressional analysts Thomas Mann of Brookings and Norm Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute wrote recently, "[E]ven those of us with strong stomachs are getting indigestion from the farcical end of the 109th Congress....With few accomplishments and an overloaded agenda, it is set to finish its tenure with the fewest number of days in session in our lifetimes, falling well below 100 days this year." The inaction has been by design. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) "decided to abandon any efforts at bipartisanship in favor of using his chamber to hold a series of highly partisan, mostly symbolic votes on conservative causes, including amendments banning gay marriage and flag burning, and fully repealing the estate tax." The legislative branch has also stumbled in its efforts to pass much-debated bills on lobbying reform, immigration, offshore oil drilling, minimum wage, and the estate tax.
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