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coalition for change <coal4chnge@...> wrote:
IT ISN'T JUST ABOUT DOOLITTLE LINING HIS OWN (AND FRIENDS') POCKETS- IT'S ALSO ABOUT WHAT'S NOT HAPPENING HERE AT HOME!
Join us in working to elect a real representative for District 4!
California's power brokers serving narrow interests
By
DANIEL WEINTRAUB
Sacramento Bee
27-JUN-06
Sacramento Bee
27-JUN-06
California's politicians chronically complain that the state is getting shortchanged by the power brokers in the nation's Capitol. But if the influential Republicans who represent the Golden State in Washington, D.C., would spend as much time working for their constituents as they do lining the pockets of their friends and relatives, California might be getting a better shake in the national budget.
The exploits of former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham are by now well known. The former fighter pilot who represented north San Diego County in Congress admitted to taking more than $2 million in bribes from military contractors in return for using his position on the House Defense Appropriations subcommittee to steer federal money their way.
"I broke the law, concealed my conduct and disgraced my high office," Cunningham said outside the federal courthouse in San Diego after pleading guilty. He is now in federal prison.
Other Republican lawmakers from California, while not implicated in criminal wrongdoing, have also disgraced their offices _ by allowing relatives and cronies to use their positions of power to personally enrich themselves.
Rep. John Doolittle, R-Roseville, was a top lieutenant to former Majority Leader Tom DeLay, a key player in the congressional leadership. Doolittle's wife, Julie, started a political events firm several years ago, a one-woman operation that Julie Doolittle runs out of the couple's suburban Virginia home.
The company, Sierra Dominion Financial Solutions, was paid more than $66,000 by the lobbying firm of
Jack Abramoff for work Julie Doolittle did on behalf of Abramoff's personal charity before the high-flying lobbyist pleaded guilty to corruption charges.
But Julie Doolittle's most lucrative client appears to be her husband. Since 2003, The Bee has reported, the congressman's campaign committees have paid his wife about $180,000 as compensation for raising campaign money for the lawmaker.
For every dollar Mrs. Doolittle raises for Mr. Doolittle's campaign, she pockets 15 cents. That means that every time Julie Doolittle approaches an individual or an interest group for a contribution to her husband's campaign, those donors know that a chunk of the money they give is going directly into the congressman's personal bank account.
It is illegal to use
political campaign funds for personal purposes, and it's easy to see why: We don't want our congressmen relying on private interests for personal financial support. But there is no law against diverting a portion of those political contributions to pay a commission to a family member, even though the end result is the same. And the Doolittles have aggressively taken advantage of that loophole.
Then there is the case of Rep. Jerry Lewis of Redlands, in San Bernardino County. Lewis is chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, the panel through which all spending bills must pass. But while California's interests have gotten short shrift there, one member of the chairman's personal staff has been getting wealthy.
Jeffrey Shockey worked for Lewis before he left to go on the payroll of a lobbying firm run by former Rep. Bill Lowery, a close friend of Lewis. In 2005, after Lewis took over as chairman of Appropriations, Shockey left the
lobbying firm and went back to work for the congressman. As he did so, he took with him a $2 million severance payout that enabled him to work on a government salary while still maintaining the lifestyle to which he had become accustomed.
Lowery's firm, in turn, marketed itself for its prowess at having congressional earmarks inserted into the budget to direct federal money to specific projects requested by the lobbyist's clients. Lewis and Shockey were in the perfect place to make those requests a reality.
California has other Republican congressmen in high places. Rep. William Thomas of Bakersfield is chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. Rep. David Dreier of San Dimas heads the Rules Committee. While neither has been connected to anything as sleazy as the Doolittle and Lewis shenanigans, they have not exactly distinguished themselves for working in the broader interests of their fellow Californians.
To put
things in perspective, consider what these power brokers could do for California if they used their influence to fix just one glaring inequity in federal law.
The matching funds the feds budget to reimburse states for providing health care to the poor are distributed through a formula based on the per capita income of each state's residents, rather than the number of poor people. This shortchanges California, because while the state has a lot of people in poverty who need health care, it also has a lot of wealthy people, which leads to a lower distribution of federal funds.
If the Medicaid formulas were based on the number of people in poverty, California's distribution would be $4 billion bigger than it is today _ enough to pretty much erase the state's chronic budget shortfall.
The nation's voters might
elect enough Democrats this fall to end Republican control of Congress. If that happens, a lot of California congressmen will lose their powerful positions in control of the public purse. But California won't lose much.
Because those lawmakers have not been doing much to help the people they were elected to represent. *
(Distributed by Scripps-McClatchy Western Service, http://www.shns.com.)
*Let's make this happen- WE CAN DO BETTER THAN DOOLITTLE!
"To be nobody-but-myself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make me everybody else - means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight, and never stop fighting." -e.e. cummings-
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