Progress made on lobbying reform
The Washington Post reports that the Senate has managed to pass a bill limiting the amount of influence lobbyists possess on Capitol Hill. While the bill does not go as far as was promised by Democrats during the election, it is definitely a positive and much-needed step in the right direction. When lobbyists use money to influence Congressional votes, the word that comes to my mind is “bribery.”
There are two downsides, though. First, in order to get a vote on this bill, Senate Democrats made it more difficult to pass the minimum-wage hike that is coming from the House. Republicans in the Senate had attempted to kill the lobbying measure by attaching an amendment to the bill that would give the president a line-item veto on spending bills - this would never have passed through the Congress (or the judiciary, but that’s another story). The line-item veto amendment will now be considered in conjunction with the minimum-wage increase, casting a shadow over that bill’s fate.
Second, the House also must pass the anti-lobbying bill for it to become law. There is speculation that the House will not agree to all of the reforms it proposes. What we can expect is a more watered-down version to finally become law. Even that would be a step in the right direction, but definitely less than this voter expected to see.
Politics | Scott Cody | 
January 19, 2007 2:20 pm
I live in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Milwaukee, WI with my wife Jen, our daughter Emerson, and son Carter.
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