Lawmakers offer ethics rules for new Congress

By Andy Sullivan Tue Dec 5, 2006

...Democratic leaders, who made the Republican "culture of corruption" a central theme of their campaign to recapture Congress, have promised to make ethics reform their first order of business when they take control in January.

The measures outlined by Meehan and other reform advocates include an independent office to investigate ethics complaints against members of Congress. That proposal was stripped out of a Senate bill in March as critics said they were capable of policing themselves.

This year's scandals proved that the existing House and Senate ethics committees aren't up to the job, reformers said.

"No group is capable of self-policing," said Connecticut Republican Rep. Christopher Shays (news, bio, voting record).       From YahooNews

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    Ethics rules and laws have come before many administrations, both Democrat and Republican, only to get shot down or watered down to where they were of no use. Maybe with the 'New Breed' of Democrats coming into power in less than a month, things will change for once.

    We can only hope, right?

 

More GOP in big business pockets?

December 04, 2006 1:40 PM

Anna Schecter Reports:

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, a former tobacco industry lobbyist, won a long battle in court to withdraw all funding for Mississippi's highly successful anti-smoking program, and last week the last dollar ran out. 

    Barbour complained that the program received its funding directly from the courts and that it needed legislative approval, according to Myers.  When the legislature passed a bill to continue the funding, Barbour vetoed it and went back to the courts to withdraw all remaining monies from the program.        From ABC News

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    Another man in big companies good graces, no doubt. Barbour's own lobbying firm made millions lobbying for big tobacco companies so it now looks as if the industry got its moneys worth.

    The lobbying firm, Barbour, Griffith & Rogers , was named the most powerful firm in the country after Bush won the Presidency. that was because of the firms close ties with the GOP. This comes from Fortune Magazine in 2001.

   Here is another poster child for ethics reform when the Democrats start looking into reform!