Senate says "Ethics, Schmethics"
You gotta be fucking kidding me.
Congress Ethics Office Rejected
A Senate panel says monitoring by an independent outside agency is unnecessary.
A key Senate committee Thursday rejected a proposal to create a new agency to oversee congressional ethics, dealing a major blow to efforts to give outsiders at least some authority to police lawmakers' conduct.
The plan to set up an independent Office of Public Integrity was derailed by the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee — despite its sponsorship by the panel's chairwoman, Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, and the ranking Democrat, Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut.
The measure's 11-5 defeat underscored the growing resistance on Capitol Hill to overhauls advocated by government watchdog groups and some lawmakers after recent political scandals. Rather than significantly rewrite their rules for conduct, most members of Congress appear to favor more extensive reporting requirements — mostly for lobbyists.
The defeat of the ethics office proposal sparked sharp criticism.
"We are really disappointed," said Mary Boyle, spokeswoman for the citizens' lobbying group Common Cause. "For Congress to produce any kind of credible reform, they need an enforcement mechanism."
The proposal called for an office, independent of the existing House and Senate ethics committees, that could initiate investigations of lawmakers. The office staff was to have been led by a director hired by congressional leaders; its findings would have been turned over to the congressional ethics panels, whose members would then have decided on any penalties.
In Thursday's debate, several senators balked at ceding even limited oversight to an outside agency.
"There is no need to reinvent the wheel," said Sen. George V. Voinovich (R-Ohio), who led opposition to the proposal. "The Office of Public Integrity is a solution in search of a problem."
Voinovich is chairman of the Senate Ethics Committee, as well as a member of the domestic security panel.
Congress Ethics Office Rejected
A Senate panel says monitoring by an independent outside agency is unnecessary.
A key Senate committee Thursday rejected a proposal to create a new agency to oversee congressional ethics, dealing a major blow to efforts to give outsiders at least some authority to police lawmakers' conduct.
The plan to set up an independent Office of Public Integrity was derailed by the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee — despite its sponsorship by the panel's chairwoman, Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, and the ranking Democrat, Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut.
The measure's 11-5 defeat underscored the growing resistance on Capitol Hill to overhauls advocated by government watchdog groups and some lawmakers after recent political scandals. Rather than significantly rewrite their rules for conduct, most members of Congress appear to favor more extensive reporting requirements — mostly for lobbyists.
The defeat of the ethics office proposal sparked sharp criticism.
"We are really disappointed," said Mary Boyle, spokeswoman for the citizens' lobbying group Common Cause. "For Congress to produce any kind of credible reform, they need an enforcement mechanism."
The proposal called for an office, independent of the existing House and Senate ethics committees, that could initiate investigations of lawmakers. The office staff was to have been led by a director hired by congressional leaders; its findings would have been turned over to the congressional ethics panels, whose members would then have decided on any penalties.
In Thursday's debate, several senators balked at ceding even limited oversight to an outside agency.
"There is no need to reinvent the wheel," said Sen. George V. Voinovich (R-Ohio), who led opposition to the proposal. "The Office of Public Integrity is a solution in search of a problem."
Voinovich is chairman of the Senate Ethics Committee, as well as a member of the domestic security panel.
posted by LexMonkey at 3/07/2006 06:24:00 PM ||
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