uncomfortably numb: The Seven Deadly Sins of the 109th Congress-The American Progress Action Fund

The Seven Deadly Sins
Few people will miss the 109th Congress. Rolling Stone called it the "worst Congress ever." Just 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 (gluttony, lust, avarice, anger, sloth, envy, and hubris) 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. If "this band of brigands in the 109th represented a major corporation, that company would be bankrupt, the shareholders would be left to clean up the mess a la Enron and WorldCom, and the executives would be facing prison. But instead of an endless parade of deserved perp walks, many of these opportunists and enablers will be re-elected," writes Michael McCord of the Portsmouth Herald. Be sure to vote on Tuesday and help wipe away Congress's sins.
GLUTTONS OF GOLFING, PROSTITUTES, EXPENSIVE MEALS: The 109th Congress will be remembered 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, which has become the symbol of the 109th Congress's gluttony. The Washington Post called it the "biggest corruption scandal to infect Congress in a generation." 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) -- have not yet been convicted in the Abramoff investigation, but their past ties to the lobbyist have been 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. Two of the federal contractors charged in that scandal admitted to arranging for a prostitute for the congressman, in addition to throwing poker parties with prostitutes that high-ranking CIA officials and lawmakers possibly attended. 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."
FOLEY SCANDAL LUST: Five conservative House members now find their re-election in jeopardy because of their failure to take appropriate action in the Mark Foley scandal. The former Republican congressman from Florida used his position of power to repeatedly send predatory, sexually explicit emails, and text messages to underage pages. At least 11 House members and staff, all Republicans, knew of the inappropriate emails sent by Foley to a page in 2005. But as ABC News reported, "Foley's obsession with 16- and 17-year-old male pages has been known to Republicans on Capitol Hill for at least five years, but, other than issue a warning, little else seems to have been done about the congressman." The Foley case "is nauseating, but the attitude of the House leadership is far worse," wrote the Winston-Salem Journal. To the American public, the Foley scandal clearly showed that the conservative leadership of the 109th Congress has been more intent on protecting its power than on representing the best interests of the American public. Seventy-nine percent of Americans believe that the House leadership was "more concerned about their political standing than about the safety of teenage Congressional pages."
CORPORATE AVARICE: Large corporations and special interests may actually miss the 109th Congress. House Majority Leader John Boehner (R-OH), who pledged to "lead the effort to bring about the kind of reforms the American people are expecting from Congress," 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, 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." The bill was largely written by a group of representatives from utility companies and the oil, gas, coal and nuclear energy industries convened by Vice President Cheney in 2001. Their recommendations were often incorporated "word for word." 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. Similarly, the House Committee on Government Reform found that 19 federal contracts worth $8.75 billion for Katrina reconstruction have "experienced significant overcharges, wasteful spending, or mismanagement." Just 30 percent of all the contracts were awarded with full and open competition; many were doled out to companies with ties to the Bush administration or federal lawmakers.
THE WRATH OF A CONGRESSMAN SCORNED: Instead of repenting for its sins, the 109th Congress has fiercely gone after its critics and attacked any challengers. Ney has blamed his troubles on the Justice Department, the media, and liberal groups, charging that they have "savaged" him and "engaged in a coordinated smear campaign." The right wing, hoping to cover up the conservative leadership's role in concealing the Foley scandal, blamed America's policies of "tolerance and diversity." Hastert simply blamed his staff. More perniciously, the conservative leadership has used its position of power to block congressional investigations. Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts (R-KS) -- whose official duty is "to provide vigilant legislative oversight over the intelligence activities of the United States" -- has repeatedly reneged on his promise to investigate Iraq pre-war intelligence. When the House Intelligence Committee released its report on Cunningham's ties to government officials, chairman Peter Hoekstra (R-MI) chastised ranking member Jane Harman (D-CA), calling the release "disturbing and beyond the pale." Shortly thereafter, Hoekstra suspended a Democratic committee staff member over his alleged release of a National Intelligence Estimate, which Harman noted was in "direct response to my decision to release the 5-page unclassified Summary of the Cunningham Report by the Special Counsel."
SLOTH 'BY DESIGN': 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." Congress adjourned for the election season passing just two of the 11 required spending bills. In March 2005, Bush, DeLay, and Frist used the tragic case of Terry Schiavo as an opportunity for political grandstanding. A memo distributed by Senate leadership to right-wing members called Schiavo "a great political issue" and urged senators to talk about her because "the pro-life base will be excited." The legislative branch has also stumbled in its efforts to pass much-debated bills onlobbying reform, immigration, offshore oil drilling, minimum wage, and the estate tax.
ENVY OF ABSOLUTE POWER: The conservative leadership of the 109th Congress wanted absolute power and set up a complicated pay-to-play system to obtain and retain it. Most emblematic of this system was the K Street Strategy -- set up by DeLay in 1995 -- which created the culture of corruption in which players like Abramoff and Cunningham flourished. DeLay explicitly stated he would operate by "the old adage of punish your enemies and reward your friends." (To gain influence over legislation, trade associations and corporate lobbyists were ordered to do three things: 1) refuse to hire Democrats, 2) hire only deserving Republicans as identified by the congressional leadership, and 3) contribute heavily to Republican coffers.) Despite being admonished by the House Ethics Committee numerous times for his conduct, DeLay's pay-to-play machine continued to plow full-speed ahead. In January, the Wall Street Journal wrote about the atrophy of Congress's principles, noting that "House Republicans have become more passionate about retaining power than in using that power to change or limit the federal government. ... Re-election unites them, however, so the leadership has gradually settled for raising money on K Street and satisfying Beltway interest groups to sustain their incumbency. This strategy has maintained a narrow majority, but at the cost of doing anything substantial. ... Ideas are an afterthought, when they aren't an inconvenience."
THE HUBRIS OF INCUMBENCY: In 1994, the right wing gained control over the House of Representatives on the strength of a series of reforms embodied in the so-called "Contract with America." The contract ostensibly "aimed to restore the faith and trust of the American people in their government" and end the "cycle of scandal and disgrace." But a year later, DeLay was already breaching the contract by setting up the K Street Strategy. With many of those lawmakers now enjoying the comfortable incumbency of the 109th Congress, that contract has been completely forgotten. The House Ethics Committee has been especially anemic, refusing to conduct appropriate and timely investigations into scandals such as the DeLay and Abramoff debacles, preferring to protect the conservative leadership. The American public is ready for a change. According to recent polls, 97 percent of Americans say that corruption in government will be an important consideration when they vote in November's elections and 85 percent want the government to commit "to the common good and put the public's interest above the privileges of the few."