"Reform Lite", Tastes Great, Less Feeling!

"GOP-crafted bill", now there is an oxymoron if ever I heard one. Jim Abrams of the AP used those words as he wrote today,

"The GOP-crafted bill approved 217-213 by the House on Wednesday requires lobbyists to file reports of their activities more frequently, obliges lawmakers to get approval before going on privately sponsored travel and takes away the pensions of lawmakers convicted of bribery."

Wow! Now that's action! Well, kinda, in a washed out, no calorie, light beer sorta way, ain't it? I mean look at it at face value, Lawmakers would have to get the nod from their counterparts before say,Golf in Scotland, or visits to Russia, that is unless of course the Lawmakers in question agreed to take a few hundred colleagues and staffers along...I mean fair is fair, right?

Next is of course the all important "loss of pension" penalty, that really holds water when the guilty party gets a potential $70,000 a year gig with the dirty lobbyist partners, probably more, and given that the current average retirement pay for Congress is less than $50,000 annually, well we can all certainly see what a hard core deterrent that is going to be. Bravo! Reform Lite!

"The sooner the better," said House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, on his preferences for getting a lobbying and ethics overhaul bill through Congress.

Well of course! Let's get it legal and in writing fast, these guys are no dummies! It is unconscionable how this near miss of a passed bill is so blatantly set out to serve the hundreds of Lawmakers at the expense of the millions of taxpayers, and we continue to support these fools? There is a clause whereby Congress members can abstain from pay raises, and many do. Right, like they aren't "getting the raise" on their own? In my decades of the Food and Beverage Industry, we learned early and remembered always, you will never 'underpay' a cook. He will simply eat the difference in 'what he thinks you short him'. My thought is there are too many cooks in Washington's kitchen, and not enough Chefs. Possessing a Culinary Degree, and a certification from the ACF as a C.E.C,(Certified Executive Chef), I believe I speak from knowledge on this subject.

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Ethics Reform, Abramoff, De Lay, Congress, Senate, Reform Lite
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