Is It Fair To Penalize Members Of Congress Who Sleep With Lobbyists?

Simple answer to the above question-- YES! YES! YES! Republicans are attacking sleazy Blue Dog chairwoman Stephanie Herseth Sandlin because her ex-congressman husband, Max Sandlin the conservative sad sack who was defeated in 2004 by Louie Gohmert when he first popped out of his trashcan, is now a sleazy K Street lobbyist. Never you mind that Republicans nominate actual lobbyists to Congress and that their leaders perform the functions of lobbyists once in Congress-- just think of John Boehner handing out pay-off checks on the floor of the House for his paymasters at Big Tobacco or, once again, John Boehner twisting GOP arms to change their votes and support Bush's 2008 no-strings-attached Wall Street bailout at the behest of his bankster paymasters. But that still doesn't make it wrong-- just grotesquely hypocritical-- for the GOP to squawk about members of Congress having lobbyists in the family. You'll know they're serious about more than just defeating Herseth Sandlin, though, when they tell John Mica (R-FL) to stop espousing the causes his family gets paid to present by their Big Oil lobbying clients.

Too close for comfort relationships between lobbyists and congressman are one of the keys to corrupt governance. In 2006 I watched how Pennsylvania voters in Delaware and Montgomery counties tossed longtime incumbent Curt Weldon out of office-- and elected Joe Sestak-- once it became apparent that Weldon's daughter set up a lobbying firm with the express purpose of acting as a bag lady and selling her father's influence to foreign potentates. It's long been standard operating procedure among Republicans and all too many Democrats have slipped into the same criminal behavior. Let me quote a Washington Post article from 2007:

When  Sen. Byron L. Dorgan (D-N.D.) rose to the Senate floor last summer and passionately argued for keeping the federal estate tax, he left one person with an interest in retaining the tax unmentioned.

The multibillion-dollar life-insurance industry, which was fighting to preserve the tax because life insurers have a lucrative business selling policies and annuities to Americans for estate planning, has employed Dorgan's wife as a lobbyist since 1999.

A few months earlier,  Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R-N.C.) had pleaded for restraint as she urged colleagues to avoid overreacting to the news that the Bush administration had let a United Arab Emirates company take over operations at six U.S. ports. At the same time, her husband, Robert J. Dole, a former senator and presidential nominee, was registered to lobby for that company and was advising it on how to save the deal from the political firestorm.

Wives, husbands, brothers, children, nephews... scores of them depend on Members of Congress for their lobbying livelihood. Tom DeLay's brother was one of the most notorious ever. Other considered among the most corrupt and sleazy K Street pond scum are Roy Blunt's wife Abigail, Steven LaTourette's wife Jennifer, and Kay Bailey Hutchison's husband, Ray (the guy who hands out the goodies for Goldman Sachs and Halliburton). Republicans complaining about Stephanie Herseth Sandlin's lobbyist husband somehow forgot to have mentioned any of them.

According to Senate lobbying records, the former Member represents a number of big-named clients, including Peabody Energy, Air Canada, Advance Auto Parts, the National Association of Broadcasters and Vanguard Health Systems-- companies with substantial legislative interests during the 111th Congress.

Max Sandlin did not respond to requests for comment for this story. Herseth Sandlin’s campaign also declined to discuss the matter in detail, offering only this statement from campaign spokeswoman Betsy Hart in an e-mail: “It is the policy of Representative Herseth Sandlin that no member of her family may lobby her or any member of her staff.”

The Congresswoman’s policy appears to be in line with House ethics rules, said Ken Gross, a lawyer at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. After a wave of negative press, Democratic leaders in both chambers adopted new-- but separate-- guidelines in the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act of 2007, a proposal that attempted to curb the perceived cozy relationship both parties had with for-profit interests.

...Senate records show that Max Sandlin and his firm were paid $160,000 in 2009 by Baptist Health Care to lobby on its behalf, including for an “increase in [the] new market tax credit” in a Democratic-backed stimulus package that Herseth Sandlin ultimately voted for.

The National Association of Broadcasters paid Sandlin and his firm $320,000 over the past two years to lobby on a variety of issues, including a bill co-sponsored by his wife, the Local Radio Freedom Act.

And Advance Auto Parts employed Sandlin and his firm last year to lobby on the Employee Free Choice Act, legislation co-sponsored by Herseth Sandlin. The contentious “card check” bill, which would make it easier for workers to unionize, is a top target of manufacturers and others in the business community.

Republicans say Herseth Sandlin’s committee assignments make it difficult for her to avoid conflicts of interest. She is member of the Agriculture, Natural Resources, Veterans’ Affairs and Energy Independence and Global Warming panels, which have broad jurisdiction over many of her husband’s clients.

“If South Dakotans were put off by Tom Daschle’s lobbying problems, they’re going to be incensed with the arrangement between Rep. Herseth Sandlin and her husband,” National Republican Congressional Committee spokesman Tom Erickson said in a statement. “The fact that Max Sandlin earns a living lobbying for legislation before his wife’s committee and bills she co-sponsors is troubling at best and potentially unethical at worst.”

And it isn't only relatives, of course, who are doing this. Former colleagues and staffers all do it. Among prominent former congressional members now lobbying their old pals are three former Senate majority leaders, Bob Dole (R-KS), Tom Daschle (D-SD) and Trent Lott (R-MS), two former House majority leaders, Dick Armey, (R-TX) and Dick Gephardt (D-MO) and one shamelessly corrupt former speaker of the House (Denny Hastert, R-IL). This is how Congress works and Congress will never stop it unless the voters force them to. Herseth Sandlin should be defeated in November, even though her opponent is even worse and likely to be even more corrupt.